Forecast accuracy
Buoy-checked receipts: Quiver vs Surfline vs the raw NOAA baseline, plus the personal Match Score number.
The forecast that learns what you like.
Surfline rates the day for the average surfer. Quiver learns your taste from the sessions you log and matches every forecast to it — on top of wave-height forecasts that beat Surfline and lap NOAA. For free.
Quiver vs NOAA
55%
less wave-height error
More than twice as sharp as the raw NOAA marine forecast.
Tighter than Surfline, too — for free.
- Beaches tracked
- 280+
- Buoy readings
- 25,000+
- Vs NOAA
- 55% better
The whole point
Surfline rates the day.
Quiver rates your day.
A 3-star day for the average surfer can be the best session of your month — your board, your skill, your wind, your tolerance for crowds. Surfline's rating is the room's average. Quiver learns what you like from every session you log, then matches each forecast to your taste.
Match Score vs your own rating
75%
agreement on which day was better
When Quiver scores one day a stronger personal match than another, it's the one you rated higher about 3 times out of 4.
- 01Rate a few sessions and the match gets personal — it learns your wave height, wind, and board fit.
- 02It also learns what you avoid, so junk days for you get marked down even when the spot looks “good.”
- 03Every log sharpens the next call. Surfline can’t do that — it doesn’t know you.
Concordance measured across 4,095 pairs of logged, rated sessions. The more you log, the sharper your match gets.
The tale of the tape
More accurate than Surfline. Twice as sharp as NOAA.
Average wave-height miss versus real buoy readings, in meters. Shorter bar means a tighter forecast.
Quiver cuts wave-height error 55% versus the NOAA baseline — and comes in tighter than Surfline.
How we measure →Lower is better. Mean absolute error vs nearby buoy observations.
How to read it
Three checks, then a plain score.
MAE means average wave-height miss in meters. Lower is better.
- 01 baseline
Start with NOAA
The raw National Weather Service marine forecast — the regional read any surfer can pull from weather.gov, free.
- 02 benchmark
Add Surfline
The paid industry standard, so the comparison is against the best forecast most surfers actually pay for — not a strawman.
- 03 receipts
Check the buoys
Every forecast is matched to real IOOS and NOAA buoy readings. Lowest average miss wins. Quiver wins.
Why Quiver lands tighter
NOAA publishes broad regional forecasts that ignore individual beach geography. Quiver tunes each break with local exposure, swell direction, shelter, and spot shape — so the number you see tracks the wave that actually shows up.
Honest about it
Nearby buoys aren't perfect proxies for every break, and NOAA is a regional marine baseline. We still put our number on the wall, right next to the competition.
Local reports sharpen the model.
Log what you saw: wave size, conditions, crowd. That signal feeds better surf calls for your break.
Report conditionsStraight answers
Forecast accuracy FAQ
Frequently Asked Questions
About surfing in surf forecast accuracy
- That's the whole idea. Surfline's star rating reflects the average surfer at a break — but a 3-star day for the average can be a great day for you, depending on your board, skill, and conditions you favor. Quiver builds a personal Match Score from the sessions you log. Across 4,095 pairs of rated sessions, when Quiver scored one day a stronger personal match than another, it was the one the surfer rated higher about 75% of the time — and it sharpens as you log more.
- We use Mean Absolute Error (MAE): the average absolute difference between a predicted wave height and the actual wave height recorded by a nearby IOOS buoy. Lower MAE means a more accurate forecast. We report MAE in meters and compare Quiver against both the raw NOAA marine baseline and Surfline.
- Yes. Against nearby buoy readings, Quiver's average wave-height miss came in lower than Surfline's — and Quiver is free. Surfline is a strong, established product; this isn't a strawman. Quiver simply tunes each break to local conditions and the buoy receipts back it up.
- Quiver's wave-height error is about 55% lower than the raw NOAA marine baseline — more than twice as sharp. NOAA publishes broad regional forecasts; Quiver corrects them per beach using local exposure, swell direction, and spot shape.
- Ground truth comes from the Integrated Ocean Observing System (IOOS) buoy network, a national network of ocean sensors operated by NOAA. Buoys report significant wave height every 1–6 hours, and we match each forecast to the nearest buoy observation within a short window.
- The NOAA baseline is the raw National Weather Service (NWS) marine wave-height forecast, unmodified — the regional average any surfer can access from weather.gov. Quiver starts from this baseline and applies per-beach corrections.
- Quiver tracks forecast accuracy across 280+ beaches, validating each against nearby buoy observations.
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