This is by no means a complete guide on "how to forecast," but hopefully these simple tips will help you get more good sessions in the water and less wasted trips to check the surf. We'll be adding more tips here as time goes on. If you'd like to submit a tip yourself, send an email to info@surfcasts.com.

Swell Period
There is a constant relationships between the period of a wave and the speed at which it travels. A longer period swell means the waves are traveling faster and have more energy. When waves have more energy, it means bigger more powerful waves at the beach. For this reason, a 5ft. swell with a 13 second period will almost always be better than an 8ft. swell with a 9 second period. Usually a swell period of 6 seconds or less indicates weaker wind swell and generally less "focused" energy. When the period is greater than 12 seconds, this typically indicates more powerful "ground" swell, which will generate bigger more powerful surf.

Swell Height
The swell height of an ocean buoy doesn't necessarily reflect the height of breaking waves at the beach. For breaking waves to form, the swell must literally collide with something: beaches, underwater shelves, and reefs are common examples. Even when the swell is the same, the breaking wave height might be totally different, for example, at a beach break with a gradual sloping bottom than it is at a rocky reef break where the wave will pick up more quickly.

Wind Direction
Just a few degrees difference in wind direction can make the difference between clean head-high waves and sloppy waist-high mush. Knowing what direction your favorite breaks face is essential to scoring good sessions. A cross shore wind at one spot could easily be offshore for a different spot just a mile down the road. The speed of the wind is also important, and the relevance varies with the direction. A 12 mph onshore wind can make otherwise powerful waves totally unridable, whereas a 12 mph offshore wind might make the wave break even better. For many spots, the best wind is often no wind.

Swell Direction
Some spots will only break when the swell is coming from a certain direction. This is especially true for reef and point breaks. Many of the best waves in the world are formed when waves hit the bottom in precisely the right way. When the swell is hitting a break directly, the waves will be bigger, cleaner, and more powerful. If you know the swell is coming from the East and your usual spot takes SE, hop in your car (or get out a map) and find a place that can maximize the current swell direction. You'll get more and better sessions if you know a couple of different spots for each swell direction.