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Woolacombe

★★★★★Fair
Beach break Faces W low tide Offshore east Best swell west

Best of the week: Monday around 14:00, 3–4 ft and offshore.

Surf now1–2ft0.4 m at 12 s from the W, wind sea 0.2 m from the SE
Wind9mphSE · offshore · gusts 15
Tide 3.1mFalling · low 01:51 (2.3 m). Works low tide.

Live webcam

Woolacombe Bay Hotel

Open the Woolacombe cam by Woolacombe Bay Hotel. Opens in a new tab.

Seven days

best session each day · swipe
Sat
2–3 ft Swell SW 9s Wind 8 mph ★★★★★
Sun
3–4 ft Swell SW 5s Wind 12 mph ★★★★★
Mon
3–4 ft Swell W 8s Wind 16 mph ★★★★★
Tue
5–7 ft Swell SW 8s Wind 18 mph ★★★★★
Wed
6–8 ft Swell W 10s Wind 8 mph ★★★★★
Thu
11–15 ft Swell W 12s Wind 20 mph ★★★★★
Sat 14 Sun 15 Mon 16 Tue 17 Wed 18 Thu 19
Time 06 09 12 15 18 06 09 12 15 18 06 09 12 15 18 06 09 12 15 18 06 09 12 15 18 06 09 12 15 18
Surf ft 1–2 1–2 1–2 1–2 2–3 2–3 3–4 3–4 3–4 4–6 4–6 3–5 3–4 2–4 2–3 4–6 7–9 6–8 5–7 5–7 6–8 6–9 6–9 7–9 7–10 11–15 11–15 10–14 9–12 8–11
Swell 12s 12s 11s 10s 8s 7s 7s 4s 5s 4s 7s 8s 8s 8s 3s 5s 6s 7s 8s 8s 10s 10s 10s 10s 11s 12s 11s 11s 10s 10s
Wind mph 12 15 13 7 9 11 17 12 12 22 3 4 10 17 17 21 19 18 18 19 7 9 9 7 9 20 23 25 24 22
Tide m 6.4↑ 7.9↓ 4.2↓ 2.6↑ 5.8↑ 5.6↑ 7.7↓ 5.1↓ 2.8↑ 5.0↑ 4.8↑ 7.2↑ 5.9↓ 3.3↓ 4.2↑ 4.2↑ 6.5↑ 6.6↓ 4.2↓ 3.6↑ 3.7↑ 5.5↑ 6.9↓ 5.2↓ 3.4↓ 3.6↓ 4.4↑ 6.8↑ 6.3↓ 3.6↓
Rating ★★★★★ ★★★★★ ★★★★★ ★★★★★ ★★★★★ ★★★★★ ★★★★★ ★★★★★ ★★★★★ ★★★★★ ★★★★★ ★★★★★ ★★★★★ ★★★★★ ★★★★★ ★★★★★ ★★★★★ ★★★★★ ★★★★★ ★★★★★ ★★★★★ ★★★★★ ★★★★★ ★★★★★ ★★★★★ ★★★★★ ★★★★★ ★★★★★ ★★★★★ ★★★★★

Surf is the face height at the beach after the swell is filtered for the way Woolacombe faces. Arrows point to where the swell and wind come from: an arrow pointing up means from the north. Tide is the height at Ilfracombe above chart datum, rising ↑ or falling ↓; the rating drops when the tide is outside the window this break works on. Amber marks the sessions worth setting an alarm for. From Tuesday the swell comes from Météo-France's 10-day model, which is coarser than the 5 km German model used close in. Hours no model reaches are left blank, not shown as flat.

Exposure

Woolacombe faces west. Measured from the seabed, it is open to swell from SW round to NW; the brighter a wedge, the deeper the water in that direction and the more of the swell gets in. Anything from behind the headlands scores nothing, however big the buoy says it is.

NESWfaces WWSE
W
0.4 m at 12 s (swell) · 100 % reaches the beach
SE
0.2 m at 2 s (wind sea) · blocked, 0 %

How Woolacombe works

Swell
Best from the west.
Wind
Offshore is from the east; anything with west in it is onshore and messes it up.
Tide
low tide.

beach break

Tide times

  • Sat 01:51Low2.3 m
  • Sat 08:20High8.0 m
  • Sat 14:13Low2.4 m
  • Sat 20:37High7.7 m
  • Sun 02:23Low2.6 m
  • Sun 08:56High7.7 m
  • Sun 14:52Low2.8 m
  • Sun 21:15High7.2 m

Ilfracombe station, 8 km away. Heights above chart datum, UK time.

Photos

In the gallery
Surfers, Woolacombe Beach - geograph.org.uk - 6011362 Lone Surfer at Woolacombe Beach - geograph.org.uk - 2860752

Ian Capper, CC BY-SA 2.0, via Wikimedia Commons. Tom Jolliffe, CC BY-SA 2.0, via Wikimedia Commons.

Comments

24 Sep 2005 · shizzles when its good, its works a treat, but for the rest of te time its just an overcrowded mush of a wave. mish on round to croyde.
1 Jul 2005 · andyo screw u all! englsnd kicks ass, ur just jealous that we are surrounded by good suring sea!
24 Mar 2005 · goofless avoid the north end. i got hit in the fave with a mini-mal. lost my two front teeth.
3 Feb 2005 · chris w too many grocs in the summer and waves rarely keep there shape in the winter. good local break but i wouldnt travel to far to get to it when you could go to croyde.
3 Feb 2005 · old rich how can you say that chris this is a clasic site which has been loyal to me for 30 years
3 Feb 2005 · mark i dont get you english dudes. surfing all winter in a freezeing mess of ice cold atlantic swell. hats of to you. whenever ive been it was messy
3 Feb 2005 · cj why would you surf her when croydes jus around the headland?
3 Feb 2005 · a combe local wollacombe is always tekeing knocks from surfers but really it aint that bad

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