San Diego Surf Forecast: More waves for Friday – peaking SW swell

On Friday we are going to see the mix of SW swells (190-220) and some building but still minimal local NW windswell. Check out the CDIP from this afternoon…I am expecting it to be similar…but with a little more westerly angle to the Southern Hemi swell, which will fill in the SD spots a little better than this chart is showing.



Surf will continue to run in the chest-shoulder high range at the average spots. The standout breaks, mostly through Northern San Diego (but sneaking into a few other areas as well), will have sets in the shoulder-head high range. Expect some longer waits between the sets…and slower shape on the higher tides.

Winds look ok tomorrow…the weather is still going to be a little unstable thanks to that upper level low pressure (there is a chance for more thunderstorms) so we might get some fluky winds. If it is clean when you look at it I would get out there because it may switch around pretty fast. Current forecasts are calling for light and variable winds through the morning and then NW winds around 10-15 knots for the afternoon.

We have waves, which is good, but I don’t think this is great swell overall. It will be inconsistent and walled up on the sets for most areas and the few breaks that can handle the longer SW lines will probably be on the crowded side. Points and reefs of North County will be the best call…and then beach breaks with piers or jetties or giant rocks will be a semi-decent fallback spot. Keep in mind that we are probably going to end up sacrificing shape for less people in the water.

Here are the tides…

03:05AM LDT -0.6 L
09:23AM LDT 3.4 H
01:57PM LDT 2.1 L
08:11PM LDT 5.8 H