South-east Queensland and Northern NSW Surf Forecast by Ben Matson (issued Friday 20th January)

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Best Days: Sun onwards: fun mix of S'ly swells in Northern NSW, but only small across SE Qld. Tricky winds through Sat (with a S'ly change across most regions) and early Sun (north of Byron) but otherwise looking fun and workable.

Recap: Fresh southerly winds resulted in not a lot of new swell for the region on Thursday, but surf size has increased today thanks to a couple of sources. A SE fetch off the coast generated weak but surfable 2ft sets for most SE Qld beaches, however surf size was bigger south of the border where a stronger S’ly groundswell filled in yesterday afternoon (across the Mid North Coast), providing sets around the 4ft mark to remaining Northern NSW coasts today. Winds were offshore early this morning but are now fresh N/NE across most regions. This south swell is now easing.

Fun set wave at Kings Beach, Sunshine Coast, this afternoon via our live surfcam

This weekend (Jan 21st - 22nd)

A deep low is forming off Tasmanian’s East Coast, and winds are expected to become pretty strong off the Far Southern NSW Coast tonight. The low will project NE into the Tasman Sea, and although the fetch around its western flank will be only short, it will become “captured” which exacerbates the potential size - even if for a brief period of time. The models have increased core wind speeds too as the low develops this evening.

This has slightly increased size prospects for Northern NSW’s south facing beaches over the weekend, though the accompanying southerly winds will render most locations quite bumpy. Surf size will start small on Saturday morning; the Mid North Coast should start to see an upwards trend in groundswell from mid-late morning (peaking overnight), and the Far North Coast probably won’t see any notable new energy until mid-late afternoon (peaking early Sunday morning). 

South swell magnets south of Byron should reach 5-6ft at the height of the swell, though there won’t be much of a spread of this size range due to the acute southerly direction: expect 3-4ft+ surf at remaining open beaches in Northern NSW, and 2ft surf inside southern corners. 

Local winds will confine the only surfable locations to protected southern corners. The change will be somewhere around Coffs Harbour at dawn, Byron Bay mid-morning and the Gold Coast late morning before it then reaches the Sunshine Coast early afternoon. We’ll also see some building windswell from the trailing fetch (which will precede the arrival of the groundswell) though quality won’t be high.

North of the border this south swell won’t do much at all. We’ll probably see a similar level of size from both the local windswell and refracted S’ly groundswell (1-2ft sets open beaches), with up to 3ft+ at exposed south swell magnets - though these locations will be blown out by the time the swell peaks early Sunday. Expect very small surf for most of Saturday; we should see light offshore winds ahead of the southerly change but the leftover energy from today won't have much oomph.

Winds will ease quite steadily into Sunday; there’ll be a lingering SE flow across SE Qld but the southern Gold Coast should see a period of early SW winds. There’s a risk for S/SE winds across the Far Northern NSW coast at times but south of Ballina or Yamba we’re likely to see light variable winds and sea breezes and an easing S’ly swell (expect an earlier, more rapid drop in size across the Mid North Coast, owing to its closer proximity to the swell source).

The Mid North Coast will also see the arrival of a new secondary S/SE groundswell on Sunday afternoon (peaking into Monday). This will have originated from the distant polar fetch that contributed a small pulse of S/SE swell on Thursday. No great size is expected from this source, but it’ll nicely arrest the otherwise easing pre-existing S’ly swell, keeping south facing beaches in the 2-3ft range late afternoon. Expect long breaks between the sets.

Next week (Mon 23rd onwards)

The long range S/SE swell due across the Mid North Coast late Sunday should continue through Monday across all Northern NSW coasts and some south swell magnets in SE Qld, with very inconsistent 2-3ft sets at open beaches with good southerly exposure. If anything it'll be a touch smaller north of Byron, so don't get too excited about surf prospects here, especially as most SE Qld beaches will be smaller again.

Conditions will be clean early morning with light offshore winds, they’ll swing NE throughout the afternoon but shouldn’t become too strong. 

Looking further ahead, and a modest ridge building across the north-eastern Tasman Sea will generate some small peaky E/SE swell for SE Qld and Far Northern NSW, through the rest of the week. No major size is likely but most open beaches should see peaky 2ft+ sets, possibly some bigger waves across the Sunshine Coast.

And the good news is that apart from a brief spell of light to moderate N’ly winds on Tuesday (fresh on the Mid North Coast), we should see mainly light variable winds and sea breeze for the second half of the week.  

A small undercurrent of long range S/SE swell will pad out Tuesday and Wednesday across Northern NSW beaches, with inconsistent sets around the 2ft mark. Some bigger waves are likely early Tuesday stemming from the back of Monday’s peak, but we’ll see size bottom out into Wednesday. 

However, the long range S/SE fetch responsible for this extended run of unusual swell is expected to strength over the weekend (close to the ice shelf), and will generate one final groundswell that’s expected around Thursday - again, set waves will be very inconsistent but we should see occasional 2-3ft sets at open beaches. Again, it'll be extremely inconsistent.

Other than that, there are no other major swell generating systems expected for the long term period. Interestingly, the models maintain a lot of strong polar activity in our recent S/SE swell window, so we could be looking at a steady supply of small long period swell across Northern NSW for the coming weeks. 

Additionally, there are signs that the top end will become quite active with tropical cyclones through the coming weeks, which also opens up possibilities for our NE and E swell windows. But there’s nothing concrete yet.

More on this on Monday, have a great weekend !