Arniston spearfishing forecast — wind, swell, visibility, tides & live cameras

spearo.app / South Africa / Arniston
PTPortuguêsRUРусскийESEspañolITItalianoELΕλληνικάFRFrançaisTRTürkçeHRHrvatski
Forecast refreshing in the background — reload the page in a minute for the latest read.
◈Arniston · South Africa
5.2
wave 1 m head-on
visibility~2m

Marginal

Today — right on the edge — wave, wind and surge pounding.

Sources: Open-Meteo · Copernicus — high confidence · data 23:09

Sources & confidence

Sources
Open-Meteo · Copernicus
Method
spearo sea-state engine: consensus of up to 6 models + satellite clarity (ZSD) + buoy-bias checks
Freshness
Re-read every hour, per coast

Compiled by the spearo sea-state engine · How it works →

The verdict comes from seven water factors and hard safety gates — not ten tabs. Go or stay.

How we score the water

Our own model

Our own forecast engine — not a third-party widget. It weighs these water factors into one go-or-stay verdict for this coast; the 0–10 dial is that verdict, read out as a number.

01
Swell & wave memory
Height, period and direction of the swell, plus the wake of recent storms — an old storm still stirs the water, and the engine remembers.
02
Wind & gusts
Speed and gusts, hour by hour — wind speed and an onshore push chop the surface and cut visibility.
03
Tide phase
Timing and range of the tide, calibrated per coast — big spring tides pull the verdict toward caution.
04
Water temperature
Sea-surface temperature — sharply cold water vetoes a green verdict.
05
Currents & outflow
Direction and drift of the current — it pushes you, and it drags turbid coastal water across where you dive.
06
Rain runoff & air clarity
Rain muddies the water inshore through land runoff, while fog and haze cut visibility at the surface.
07
Coast shape & exposure
How the coast faces the swell — a sheltered cove keeps the water clean; an exposed, head-on point takes a penalty.

Safety gates

  • Thunderstorm forecast — an instant red, no exceptions.
  • An official warning (MeteoAlarm / IPMA) — yellow, or red for the higher ranks.
  • Missing input data — a would-be green is capped to yellow rather than overstated.
  • Strong disagreement between forecast models — a green day is pulled back to yellow.
  • Night hours — where night spearfishing is banned by law the window is forced red; where it is legal (Australia outside NSW, New Zealand, South Africa) it is capped at yellow, never green.

It all folds into a single 0–10 score and one verdict: go or stay.

A forecast, not a guarantee — the sea has the last word.

Entry pointsNo-take zones

Where to get in, where to hunt

Entry points with coordinates
Seabed relief — promising ground

This verdict — in your pocket. Open the app for the week's window.

Coming soon

Get the go / no-go verdict for Arniston by email

Leave your email — and the moment a window opens at Arniston, we'll send the go / no-go verdict. Email is all we need.

Optional: city, channel, phone
What to send
Where to send it
More spots

Spots in South Africa

🇿🇦South Africa

South Africa map →

Nearby towns

  • Struisbaai
  • Gansbaai
  • Hermanus
  • Stilbaai
  • Gordon's Bay

Western Cape

  • Simon's Town
  • Muizenberg
  • Hout Bay
  • Cape Town
  • Langebaan
  • Saldanha

Garden Route

  • Mossel Bay
  • Knysna
  • Plettenberg Bay

Eastern Cape

  • Jeffreys Bay
  • Gqeberha
  • Port Alfred
Feedback

Help us make it better

What's missing? Tell us what you'd like to see — new spots, species, data or features. We read everything.

spearo.app · a private marine instrument · Arniston · a planner, not a safety guaranteePrivacy
Today
Notify me
Map
Download on theApp Store
GET IT ONGoogle Play
Google Play — QR code
point your camera
0 m

Surface

Wind, wave and the swell windows — when to go and the best hours.

spearo.app
updated 23:09
Arniston — solo, off the rocks
BORDERLINE
caution — solo off the rocks is risky, check on site · wind 14 km/h
wave 1 m head-onwind 14 km/hsurge pounding the rocksvisibility ~2 m
today, best window 09:00–12:00
fish · Visibility 2 m · Water 17.9°C
confidence low · verdict for the selected day
Best window · next 3 days
borderlineTuesday · 09:00–12:00
you can see ~2 m ahead fish

Tell me when it's on

Just your email — nothing else needed.

Whole week — tap a day. is driving swell right now.
›
Solo risk: carry a float · tell someone your plan and exit time · doubt = don't go. A model-based planner; the call is made on site.
Selected day

Windows, hours
and the day's trends.

The day is picked above, in the hero. Here are that day's windows, the hour-by-hour map and the trends. Tap a window to break down the conditions.

Sunday · today2026-10-25
05:44–19:01 · full moon
▲ 02:00▼ 08:00▲ 14:00▼ 20:00 · 2.1 m
Hours (06→20)
06
09
12
15
18
Day's trends
Tide-0.64 m
Wave0.92 m
Wind9 km/h
Water18 °C
fish activity: moon overhead 00:00 · high · moonset 04:54 · moderate · moon underfoot 11:40 · high · moonrise 18:32 · moderate
Conditions window06:00–09:00
don't go fish
Hs 1.02 m · roughperiod 6.8 swind 3→9surge 3.8viz 3 m
1.02 mrough · up to ~2.04 · 205° at an angle
6.8 sswell moderate
3→9gusts 9 km/h
3.8pounding the rocks
0.11m/s
3 msatellite: water here is usually murkier
17.7°C5 mm + hood
▼08:00tide turn near
Atmosphere0 kmlandmarks visible
lowoff the lunar peaks
  • fog <1 km — no landmarks visible
  • low water — slack
confidence lowtwilight
Open the seafloor map with entry points →

Your best window — with you. Forecast in your pocket.

Download on theApp StoreGET IT ONGoogle Play
Google Play — QR code
point your camera
−10 m

The water column

Visibility and what drives it — post-storm clearing, river plume, temperature and the thermocline.

What it is

A marine instrument,
go / no-go for solo hunting.

spearo.app folds wind, wave, swell period, visibility, tides, water temperature and risk into a single verdict — go to the spot or not. It computes 7 days ahead from open marine models (Open-Meteo, IPMA), with no sign-up and no accounts. Built for solo spearfishing off the rocks, where any mistake costs dearly.

Now live: 3016 spots across 406 stretches of coast — mainland Portugal, Madeira and the Azores.

See all spots →
−20 m

The seabed

Relief and bottom type, tides, and the depths of each spot.

On the rock

The forecast is the plan.
The call is on the rock.

The models set the window. Whether you go in is read only at the water: count the sets, watch the surge on the entry. If in doubt, you don't get in.

Entry points

Where to get in
off the rocks.

Scouted entries, coloured by today. The colour is the sea state at the spot, not a guarantee: the wash and a slippery entry you judge on site.

Open the seafloor map →
Roman Beach reefArniston
borderline
exposed head-on to the swell today
window
—

Rocky reef off Waenhuiskrans village, west of De Hoop MPA; roman, galjoen and kob. Do not stray east into the De Hoop no-take zone.

Google Maps
Waenhuiskrans cave pointArniston
borderline
exposed head-on to the swell today
window
—

Reef by the sea-cave point; sheltered galjoen ground on light SE. De Hoop MPA boundary sits just to the east.

Google Maps

SOLO is the biggest risk: underwater you can black out from lack of oxygen silently and fatally, with no one around. Solo is never truly «safe». Below are the best weather windows; carry a buoy, tell someone your plan and exit time, and any doubt — don't go.

One morning glance — and you know.

Download on theApp StoreGET IT ONGoogle Play
Google Play — QR code
point your camera
≈

Surfacing

Cameras, map and reference — to hand as you come up.

Live cameras, map & reference
Open the seafloor map →
Reference

What's in season,
what the law says.

In season now
  • yellowtail
    Seriola lalandi · 3–40 m · legal
  • garrick / leervis
    Lichia amia · 1–20 m · legal
  • geelbek (Cape salmon)
    Atractoscion aequidens · 5–40 m · legal
  • galjoen (national fish)
    Dichistius capensis · 0–12 m · ⚠️ closed season/limit
    National fish but NOT no-take: legally spearable (35 cm, bag 2), closed 15 Oct–end Feb.
  • kob / kabeljou
    Argyrosomus japonicus · 2–30 m · legal
  • red roman
    Chrysoblephus laticeps · 5–40 m · legal
  • king mackerel (couta/cuda)
    Scomberomorus commerson · 1–25 m · legal
  • elf / shad
    Pomatomus saltatrix · 1–20 m · ⚠️ closed season/limit
    ⚠️ Closed 1 Sep–30 Nov (spawning). Don't take it then.
  • East London

    • Wild Coast

    • Coffee Bay
    • Port St Johns

    KwaZulu-Natal

    • Margate
    • Shelly Beach
    • Port Shepstone
    • Scottburgh
    • Umkomaas
    • Durban
    • Umhlanga
    • Ballito
    • Richards Bay
    • St Lucia
    • Sodwana Bay

    spearo.app — All countries

    transparency nearby ~9 m · satellite, 2 days agosatellite estimate · may differ right at the shore

  • white musselcracker
    Sparodon durbanensis · 3–30 m · legal
  • hottentot
    Pachymetopon blochii · 2–25 m · legal
    • Law
    • ✓You need a endorsed for SPEARFISHING (MLRA 18/1998). Buy it online (fishing.dffe.gov.za) or at an authorised office (SAPO branch) — check the current fee there. Own use only — sale is banned.
    • ✓Breath-hold + snorkel only — scuba/hookah are BANNED (reg 8). Spearfishing in is FULLY BANNED (reg 16, no exceptions). Daily cap of 10 fish total. Inside an obey the managing authority; in several you can't even CARRY a speargun.
    • •NIGHT — the recreational spearfishing brochure (MLRA 18/1998) carries no time-of-day restriction: diving at night is legal. The permit, breath-hold-only, the blanket ban and conditions all apply around the clock; shark risk is worse after dark — that is safety, not law.
    • ⛔ 🚫 Table 3 (zero possession): brindle bass (Epinephelus lanceolatus), potato bass (E. tukula), seventy-four (moratorium since 1998), great white / whale / basking sharks, sawfishes, coelacanth, Natal wrasse.
    • ⛔ 🚫 All hard corals, sea fans and sea pens (Scleractinia/Gorgonacea/Pennatulacea) — protected. Seahorses/pipefish (Syngnathidae) — no-take.
    • ⛔ 🚫 Spearfishing in is FULLY BANNED (reg 16 — no exceptions). Inside an obey the managing authority's conditions; in several you can't even CARRY a speargun (Sardinia Bay, Bird Island, Robben Island etc.). Abalone (perlemoen) — recreationally closed until further notice.

    Rules change. Before heading out, check with the DFFE (Marine Recreational Fishing brochure / permit) and the MPA managing authority (SANParks / CapeNature / Ezemvelo KZN / ECPTA / iSimangaliso).

    Safety protocol
    • Sets: watch the wave trains ≥15 min before entering; Hmax ≈ 2×Hs, the wash can run 50 m past the foam line. A lull >10 min with period >12 s = a big set «overdue», do NOT enter; enter right after a full set passes and re-check at minute 30.
    • Exit FIRST: find your exit AND a backup before entering. On a rocky/boulder shore a 0.5 m rise in swell can make the exit impossible — getting pinned/unable to climb out is the main killer.
    • Headland rip: prominent points often have a permanent topographic rip regardless of the model — locate it, enter/exit on the windward side, never swim against it.
    • Cold: wetsuit per the SST chip; the first shiver = a metabolic surge and a drop in breath-hold → get out at the first steady shiver. Cap the session at 45–60 min below 15 °C.
    • Solo discipline: buoy up; tell someone the spot and exit time; conservative breath-hold (never push it in cold/murky/surfy water); visibility <3 m — don't enter.
    • Afternoon wind: on many coasts the wind builds from midday — plan to be out of the water by midday; the chop builds — get out.
    • UV 11:00–15:00 (UVI ≥6): sunscreen and cover up on the surface interval.
    • Solo is a fundamental risk (hypoxic blackout with no buddy). Any doubt = No-go.

    FAQ — spearfishing in Arniston

    Where can I spearfish in Arniston?

    Arniston has rock entry points such as Roman Beach reef and Waenhuiskrans cave point. Arniston (Waenhuiskrans) — a quiet fishing village on the Agulhas coast with reef and the famous sea cave; kob, galjoen and musselcracker. Below you'll find each spot (access, shelter and hazards) and today's forecast.

    When is the best season in Arniston?

    Best clean days come after the SE wind (upwelling); cold, sharks present.

    How cold is the water in Arniston?

    10–18 °C — 5–7 mm suit; cold Benguela, the SE upwelling drops it further.

    Is Arniston good for a beginner?

    Hard: cold Benguela, swell, white-shark presence; dive after the SE clears it.

    Do I need a licence in Arniston?

    Yes — in Arniston, as everywhere on the mainland, you need a recreational fishing licence (DGRM); breath-hold only (no scuba), with a marker buoy and no night diving. See the guide for the details.

    Full guide: spearfishing in South Africa →
    Data partners
    dive centres that send us real visibility readings
    Águas VivasMilfontes · Sagres