Name: Surf Balls - Wind, Wave and Tide data
Rating: 4.9 (32 reviews)
Author: pjt_glossop

NEW : Surf Balls watchfaces (digital available for all devices, analogue for newer devices only) are now also available...just search for it in the app store

This widget provides all of the information to decide whether it's a good day to go surfing based on 4 key factors (wave height, difference in wind/wave direction, wind speed and wave period) in a set of 4 balls (and the bigger the ball the better!).  For a given location it will display the surf balls and associated information, such as sunrise/sunset and tide high/low height and times for the next 24 hours. There are also wind (green) and wave (blue) arrows which move around the edge of the display and scale to denote direction and strength. 


The initial screen displayed is for the current hour (time block highlighted in red) and then you can scroll through the next 23 hour timeslots using the up/down buttons or swiping up/down.  All of the data is sourced from Stormglass.io which is a pretty cool global weather API and in addition to the surf balls the following data is displayed :


   - Wind : speed, gust and direction
   - Waves : height, period and direction
   - Temperature : air and water
   - Daylight : sunrise and sunset (and UV Index if the option is selected)
   - Tide : tide station, distance from current co-ordinates, tide height, high/low tide time and height (and tide graph if the option is selected)


You can set 2 locations in the widget settings, my reasoning for this is that personally I want to know about conditions at a location I want to go to, rather than necessarily when I am already there. However it is also possible to use the GPS to get your current location if you want. To chose which location to use press the start/stop button (top right) or swipe left screen and it will take you into a view where you can choose which location to use (use up/down buttons or swipe up/down; use start/stop button or tap screen to select location...swiping right will exit without changing location). NOTE the GPS option will only turn green when your watch has a good fix and so may stay red (and so not selectable) if you are testing the widget indoors.


There are a number of other display options you can choose from :


   - The amount of data displayed : you can choose between less data, which makes the display less 'busy' but missing some useful information or more data that has it all including a tide graph
   - The colour scheme : you can choose between keeping it simple and monochrome or something a bit brighter and more colourful, including an option that adds details of the UV Index
   - The display units : you can choose between imperial and metric


I am not a professional developer and I originally started this for as a personal project just for my own use but then decided to share it. If you like it then great, if you don't then that's fine too (just uninstall it). If you find any bugs or have any positive suggestions and feedback in a review as I'm always interested in ways to enhance it.