aid: ndbc name: NDBC — National Data Buoy Center description: >- The NOAA National Data Buoy Center (NDBC) operates a global network of over 1,000 moored buoys, drifting buoys, Coastal-Marine Automated Network (C-MAN) stations, and partner stations that continuously measure and transmit meteorological and oceanographic conditions. Real-time and historical data — wind direction and speed, wave height and period, sea surface temperature, atmospheric pressure, air temperature, dew point, visibility, and salinity — are distributed freely via HTTP file URLs, a THREDDS/OPeNDAP server (NetCDF), an RSS observation feed, and a latest-observations snapshot updated every five minutes. No API key or authentication is required; data is in the public domain under U.S. government open-data policy. image: https://www.ndbc.noaa.gov/images/nws/nws_logo.png url: https://raw.githubusercontent.com/api-evangelist/ndbc/refs/heads/main/apis.yml access: 3rd-Party created: '2026-06-13' modified: '2026-06-13' position: Consumer specificationVersion: '0.19' tags: - NOAA - Marine - Buoys - Ocean - Weather - Waves - Meteorological - Oceanographic - Real-Time - Historical - Government - Open Data apis: - aid: ndbc:realtime-data-service name: NDBC Real-Time Data Service description: >- Provides access to the last 45 days of meteorological and oceanographic observations from NDBC moored buoys and C-MAN coastal stations. Data files are served via HTTPS at https://www.ndbc.noaa.gov/data/realtime2/ and named by station identifier and measurement type (e.g., 41002.txt for standard meteorology, 41002.spec for spectral wave summaries). Measurement types include standard meteorology (wind, pressure, temperature, waves), continuous winds, spectral wave data (summaries, raw energy density, directional components), ADCP currents, oceanographic parameters, and tide data. Most stations report hourly; data typically appears within 25 minutes after the hour. Missing values are represented as MM. image: https://www.ndbc.noaa.gov/images/nws/nws_logo.png humanURL: https://www.ndbc.noaa.gov/faq/rt_data_access.shtml baseURL: https://www.ndbc.noaa.gov/data/realtime2 tags: - Real-Time - Buoys - Meteorological - Oceanographic - Waves - Winds - Temperature - Pressure properties: - type: Documentation url: https://www.ndbc.noaa.gov/faq/rt_data_access.shtml - type: Documentation url: https://www.ndbc.noaa.gov/docs/ndbc_web_data_guide.pdf - type: Documentation url: https://www.ndbc.noaa.gov/faq/measdes.shtml - type: BaseURL url: https://www.ndbc.noaa.gov/data/realtime2/ contact: - FN: NDBC Webmaster email: webmaster.ndbc@noaa.gov x-products: - name: Free url: /plans/free.md x-rate-limits: - url: /rate-limits/rate-limits.md x-finops: - url: /finops/finops.md - aid: ndbc:latest-observations-service name: NDBC Latest Observations Service description: >- Delivers a consolidated snapshot of the most recent observation from every active NDBC and partner station, refreshed every five minutes. The flat text file at https://www.ndbc.noaa.gov/data/latest_obs/latest_obs.txt contains 23 columns (station ID, latitude, longitude, UTC timestamp, wind direction and speed, gust, wave height, dominant and average wave period, mean wave direction, atmospheric pressure, pressure tendency, air temperature, water temperature, dew point, visibility, and tide). Per-station RSS files and a geographic observation search RSS feed are also available. No authentication required. image: https://www.ndbc.noaa.gov/images/nws/nws_logo.png humanURL: https://www.ndbc.noaa.gov/faq/rss_access.shtml baseURL: https://www.ndbc.noaa.gov/data/latest_obs tags: - Latest Observations - Real-Time - All Stations - RSS - Snapshot properties: - type: Documentation url: https://www.ndbc.noaa.gov/faq/rss_access.shtml - type: BaseURL url: https://www.ndbc.noaa.gov/data/latest_obs/latest_obs.txt - type: BaseURL url: https://www.ndbc.noaa.gov/rss/ndbc_obs_search.php contact: - FN: NDBC Webmaster email: webmaster.ndbc@noaa.gov - aid: ndbc:historical-archive-service name: NDBC Historical Archive Service description: >- Provides quality-controlled historical observations from NDBC stations organized as annual files (prior years) and monthly files (current year) accessible at https://www.ndbc.noaa.gov/data/historical/. Measurement categories mirror the real-time service: standard meteorology, continuous winds, spectral wave data, ADCP currents, and oceanographic parameters. Data formats and column definitions are identical to the real-time files except that missing values use variable counts of nines (999, 9999, 99.0) rather than MM. A web-based historical observation search is available at histsearch.php and climatic summaries at climate.php. image: https://www.ndbc.noaa.gov/images/nws/nws_logo.png humanURL: https://www.ndbc.noaa.gov/faq/archive.shtml baseURL: https://www.ndbc.noaa.gov/data/historical tags: - Historical - Archive - Climate - Quality-Controlled - Annual - Monthly properties: - type: Documentation url: https://www.ndbc.noaa.gov/faq/archive.shtml - type: Documentation url: https://www.ndbc.noaa.gov/faq/measdes.shtml - type: BaseURL url: https://www.ndbc.noaa.gov/data/historical/ - type: Documentation url: https://www.ndbc.noaa.gov/histsearch.php - type: Documentation url: https://www.ndbc.noaa.gov/climate.php contact: - FN: NDBC Webmaster email: webmaster.ndbc@noaa.gov - aid: ndbc:thredds-netcdf-service name: NDBC THREDDS/OPeNDAP NetCDF Service description: >- Exposes NDBC station time-series data as NetCDF files through a THREDDS Data Server (TDS) at https://dods.ndbc.noaa.gov/ using the OPeNDAP protocol. Dataset categories include standard meteorology (stdmet), continuous winds (cwind), spectral wave density (swden), acoustic Doppler current profiler (adcp, adcp2), oceanographic (ocean), water level (wlevel), DART tsunami (dart), and peak/mean currents (pwind, mmbcur). Files follow the naming pattern SSSSStYYYY.nc; real-time files use year 9999. An OceanSITES-format TAO buoy collection and HF Radar surface currents are also available via the same server. image: https://www.ndbc.noaa.gov/images/nws/nws_logo.png humanURL: https://dods.ndbc.noaa.gov/ baseURL: https://dods.ndbc.noaa.gov tags: - NetCDF - THREDDS - OPeNDAP - Scientific Data - Currents - Tsunami - OceanSITES properties: - type: Documentation url: https://dods.ndbc.noaa.gov/ - type: BaseURL url: https://dods.ndbc.noaa.gov/ - type: Documentation url: https://dods.ndbc.noaa.gov/oceansites/ contact: - FN: NDBC Webmaster email: webmaster.ndbc@noaa.gov - aid: ndbc:hf-radar-service name: NDBC HF Radar Surface Currents Service description: >- Provides near-real-time ocean surface current speeds and directions derived from High-Frequency (HF) radar systems operated by NDBC and partner networks in various nearshore areas of the United States. Both hourly and 25-hour averaged current products are available. The service is accessible at https://hfradar.ndbc.noaa.gov/ and integrates with the broader NDBC station data infrastructure. Data supports maritime safety, search and rescue operations, and coastal oceanographic research. image: https://www.ndbc.noaa.gov/images/nws/nws_logo.png humanURL: https://hfradar.ndbc.noaa.gov/ baseURL: https://hfradar.ndbc.noaa.gov tags: - HF Radar - Surface Currents - Coastal - Nearshore - Real-Time properties: - type: Documentation url: https://hfradar.ndbc.noaa.gov/ - type: BaseURL url: https://hfradar.ndbc.noaa.gov/ contact: - FN: NDBC Webmaster email: webmaster.ndbc@noaa.gov common: - type: Portal url: https://www.ndbc.noaa.gov/ - type: Documentation url: https://www.ndbc.noaa.gov/docs/ndbc_web_data_guide.pdf - type: Documentation url: https://www.ndbc.noaa.gov/faq/rt_data_access.shtml - type: Documentation url: https://www.ndbc.noaa.gov/faq/measdes.shtml - type: Documentation url: https://www.ndbc.noaa.gov/faq/stations.shtml - type: Contact url: https://www.ndbc.noaa.gov/contacts.shtml - type: PrivacyPolicy url: https://www.noaa.gov/privacy-policy - type: TermsOfService url: https://www.noaa.gov/disclaimer - type: Plans url: /plans/free.md - type: RateLimits url: /rate-limits/rate-limits.md - type: FinOps url: /finops/finops.md maintainers: - FN: Kin Lane email: kin@apievangelist.com