How to Read an OBX Tide Table
Tide tables look intimidating, but they’re really just four columns of numbers. Once you know what each one means, you can plan a fishing trip, a beach drive, or a kayak launch in under thirty seconds.
What a tide table shows
A typical NOAA-style tide table lists, for each day:
- Time of each high and low tide (usually four entries per day for the OBX)
- Type of tide — H for high, L for low
- Height in feet above the tidal datum (usually MLLW)
- Date and day of the week
A sample row, decoded
Sat May 24 02:30 AM L 0.5 ft
Sat May 24 08:40 AM H 2.4 ft
Sat May 24 02:40 PM L 0.4 ft
Sat May 24 09:00 PM H 2.7 ft
That tells you: low tide at 2:30 AM (0.5 ft above the chart datum), high tide at 8:40 AM (2.4 ft), then a second low at 2:40 PM, and the day’s highest high at 9:00 PM.
What the numbers actually mean
The height is not the water depth
A “0.5 ft” low tide doesn’t mean there’s only 6 inches of water at the pier. It means the water is 0.5 ft above the local MLLW datum — the average lowest low tide at that station. Actual depth at any particular spot depends on the seafloor below MLLW (which a nautical chart will show).
Negative tides
If you see a negative number (like “-0.3 ft”), that’s a tide lower than MLLW. Common during perigean spring tides. These are great for shelling and the lowest-water boat-ramp moments.
Time zones and daylight saving
NOAA’s web tide tables for OBX stations are in local time and automatically adjust for daylight saving time. Apps and almanacs sometimes don’t — if your times look off by an hour twice a year, that’s the cause.
Pick the right station
The OBX has multiple NOAA tide stations, and they don’t all behave the same. Pick one close to where you’re actually fishing or boating:
| Station | Best for | Mean range |
|---|---|---|
| Duck, NC (8651370) | North OBX oceanfront: Corolla through Kitty Hawk | ~3.4 ft |
| Oregon Inlet Marina (8652587) | Inlet boating; Bodie Island south end | ~1.9 ft |
| USCG Hatteras (8654467) | Hatteras Island sound side; Cape Point area | ~1.6 ft |
| Ocracoke (8654792) | Ocracoke ocean and sound beaches | ~2.0 ft |
For oceanfront fishing at Avon, Salvo, or Rodanthe, use Duck or interpolate between Duck and Hatteras (your tide is about 20-30 minutes later than Duck).
Reading the chart on this site
The interactive tide chart at the top of our main tide page shows the same data graphically. Key things to look at:
- The curve — peaks are highs, valleys are lows. Steeper sections = faster water movement.
- Marker dots — labeled H or L, with the height in feet.
- The red “NOW” line — current time, so you can see at a glance whether the tide is rising or falling right now.
- The summary cards — pre-computed values for current height, next high, and next low.
Three common mistakes
- Using the wrong station. The tide at Duck is roughly an hour different from the tide inside Pamlico Sound. Don’t rely on one station for the whole coast.
- Ignoring wind. Tide tables predict only the astronomical tide. A strong onshore wind can add a foot to the predicted high, and a strong offshore wind can drop the predicted low by the same.
- Forgetting daylight saving. Twice a year, double-check your tide app actually shifted with the clock.
Where the data comes from
NOAA’s Center for Operational Oceanographic Products and Services (CO-OPS) computes tide predictions from harmonic constants — long-term measurements decomposed into individual sine waves. Every prediction you see on this site, in apps, and in printed almanacs ultimately traces back to that same harmonic data. The official source is tidesandcurrents.noaa.gov; the chart on this site uses simplified harmonics calibrated to those values.