When I moved from San Diego to Chicago, I knew people surfed the Great Lakes. I’d seen the ice beards, the annual double overhead Lake Superior swell that makes the rounds on Instagram, Ben Gravy’s videos, etc.
But I had no idea what the surf was like on a regular basis. Is it real surfing? Or is it a novelty you tolerate because you live here now?
What is an average swell like as opposed to the one day a year that ends up passed around social media? How many days a year can I surf?
I was worried I'd get maybe five days a year and spend the rest of the time looking at clips from California. Or I'd end up on a longboard most days, and I am decidedly not a longboarder (nothing against it, it’s just not my thing).
Some of that turned out to be true. But a lot of it didn't.
While I wouldn’t classify the waves here as “world class”, there are much better waves on the Great Lakes than most people realize. Clean, chest-to-head-high swells happen far more often than you’d think. And more often than not, there isn’t anyone on them.
Here’s the guide to finding and surfing the best waves the Great Lakes have to offer that I wish I had back when I moved here.
Can you actually surf the Great Lakes?
Yes. People surf all five Great Lakes year-round and there's a dedicated community that chases waves here week in and week out.
A good winter swell on the south end of Lake Michigan.
The catch is that you do have to chase waves here — a lot more than on the coasts. Lake swells are wind-driven, short-lived, and move around from day to day (and sometimes hour to hour). So if you rock up at your favorite spot and expect to surf whatever's there, it'll be flat nine times out of ten.
Being mobile matters a lot more than it does on the coast.
Surf on the Great Lakes: what to expect
A slightly below-average swell at this spot.
A good in-season swell on the Great Lakes is typically waist to head high, and shows up two to four times a month. In winter, the best swells can push into the overhead range (and well beyond that on Lake Superior), but those only show up a couple times a season, and usually only in the winter.
However, if you're coming from the ocean, the biggest adjustment isn't size — it's power. Everything here is windswell. An 8-second period is a good day, and you might see double digits once a decade. So even an overhead day here breaks softer, with less push, than an ocean wave of the same height.
It's real surf, just with the juice turned way down.
Swell and surf session frequency
The number of surfable days you get here on the Great Lakes depends heavily on what you personally consider “surfable” and how much effort you’re willing to put in to find those waves.
That’s why if you ask Reddit what to expect you'll get answers from "three or four" to "110 per year." No one is lying, they just all have different thresholds for what looks like fun.
I'll out myself here: once November hits, I'm not out there as much as the hardcore lake crew. When it gets really cold, I only go if it's chest high or better. And once the New Year's hangover is in the rearview, I'm usually in an Uber to O'Hare to catch a flight somewhere warm until May.
Then there are people like @arenzy, who surf everything year-round: big or small, warm or cold. Ten minutes of his Instagram clips will give you a good sense of what regular sessions on the Lakes looks like.
(To be fair, Aaron also has better and more consistent waves up in Sheboygan than I do down in Chicago.)
The right surfboard — and learning how to forecast — can genuinely move your threshold for you. I'll get into both of those later on, but they’re the two biggest levers you have to boost your session count (besides a car).
The best season to surf the Great Lakes
Fall (September–November) is the best overall season to surf the Great Lakes, and winter (December–March) has the biggest waves. Spring and summer are the shoulder/off-seasons here.
Here’s a detailed breakdown of what to expect, season by season:
| Season | Typical waves | How often it's good | What it's like |
|---|---|---|---|
| Fall Sep–Nov |
Chest to head high and better | 2–4 good swells a month | The most consistent season. The water is still warm from summer, so sessions are comfortable. |
| Winter Dec–Mar |
4–5 ft is common on good days; double overhead and bigger a few times a season | 3–6 big swells per winter, when the lakes aren't frozen | The best waves of the year, but the water is near freezing, sessions top out around an hour, and some breaks freeze over entirely. |
| Spring Apr–Jun |
Small and inconsistent | Only during late cold snaps (locals call it "Third Winter") | You'll still need a winter-weight suit into May, or June on the northern lakes. |
| Summer Jul–Aug |
Small, soft, and short-lived | Rare | Boardshorts weather, and everyone who paddles out is stoked to be there. |
Lake waves are created by wind in real time, and wind builds waves most efficiently when the air is much colder than the water. So prime surf seasons/days are always when the air is colder than the water.
If you're new to the Lakes, start in the fall. You'll get the most waves in the most comfortable conditions, and you'll learn how the lakes behave before you're also fighting the cold.
Winter also brings shelf ice along the shoreline, which is a serious hazard if you try to cross it to reach the water. I've covered how to handle it in my guide to surfing Chicago.
Forecasting Surf on the Great Lakes
NOAA’s GLERL Tool that I often use to forecast surf on the Great Lakes.
A Great Lakes surf forecast is really a wind forecast in disguise. Lake waves don't travel in from somewhere else like they do in the ocean — they're created by whatever wind is blowing across the lake right at that moment, and they fade within hours once it stops.
So it’s actually simpler to forecast surf here on the Lakes than it is in the ocean because you’re only forecasting one thing instead of two (you just have to forecast the local weather, instead of local weather and the swell itself swell).
Here’s how the two compare:
| Ocean | Great Lakes | |
|---|---|---|
| Where the swell comes from | Distant storms, often thousands of miles away | Wind blowing across the lake right now |
| Typical swell period | Often 10–20+ seconds for groundswell | 8 seconds or less; double digits maybe once a decade |
| How far ahead you can plan | A week or more | About two days, and it's not reliable until the night before |
| How long a swell lasts | Days | Usually 3–6 hours, occasionally a couple of days |
| Wind during the swell | Can be glassy or offshore | Onshore, because the wind making the waves is the wind blowing at you |
| Best forecasting tools | Surfline and similar swell models | NOAA's GLERL wave model and Windfinder |
It’s worth noting that since all surf on the Great Lakes is “real time windswell,” you can’t forecast as far ahead of time as you can in the ocean. Local weather can be somewhat unpredictable more than 2-3 days out.
So when I’m reading a forecast, I don't treat it as locked in until the night before, and quite often, until the morning of. A wind event can shift east or west overnight and miss your spot entirely, even if it looked good the evening before.
For a deeper breakdown on how I approach forecasting, including why I don’t recommend Surfline for the Lakes, see my full guide to forecasting surf on the Great Lakes.
Which Great Lake is best for surfing?
Lake Michigan is the most surfed of the Great Lakes, and has a longer winter season than most because it freezes less. However, Lake Superior gets the biggest and most ocean-like waves.
Erie and Ontario line up with prevailing weather patterns but produce weaker waves due to shorter fetch, and Huron behaves a lot like Lake Michigan, but with less fetch (i.e. smaller/softer waves).
The difference comes down to each lake's shape and orientation. Weather in this part of the world generally moves west to east, so a lake whose long axis runs east–west has its longest fetch pointed the same way the weather is already moving. Superior, Erie, and Ontario are built that way. Michigan and Huron run north–south, so they rely on the rotating winds of passing low-pressure systems instead (more on that below).
Once you know which setup suits each lake, you can look at a weather map and make a reasonable guess about which stretch of shoreline will light up. Here’s a break down lake by lake.
| Lake | Longest fetch | Best setup | Where the waves hit | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Superior | West–east, 300+ miles | West winds (low passing north); northeast winds (low passing south) | East shore on west winds; west shore, including Duluth and the North Shore, on northeast winds | Biggest, most ocean-like waves |
| Michigan | North–south | North/northwest winds behind a low; south winds ahead of one | South end on north winds; north end on south winds; angled winds shift waves to the Michigan or Wisconsin/Illinois shores | One of the most surfed lakes; freezes less, so winter runs longer |
| Huron | North–south (main basin) | Similar to Lake Michigan | Similar to Lake Michigan | About 100 miles less fetch than Michigan; the bays have their own patterns |
| Erie | West-southwest to east-northeast, 241 miles | West/southwest winds | Eastern end: Buffalo, the New York shoreline, Presque Isle | Shallowest lake; weaker, shorter-lived swells; freezes earliest |
| Ontario | East–west, 193 miles | Low tracking north of the lake from the Ohio Valley | Eastern shore | Biggest waves in fall and spring; freezes less |
Lake Michigan
Best setup: North and northwest winds on the back side of a low for the south end; south winds on the front side of a low for the north end.
Lake Michigan's longest fetch runs north to south, which seems like it should work against the west-to-east weather pattern. But low-pressure systems rotate counterclockwise. As one passes, you get south winds ahead of it and north to northwest winds behind it, and those winds have the full length of the lake to build waves.
That means the most powerful waves usually hit the north and south ends of the lake. When those north or south winds come in at an angle, which they often do, the waves shift onto the Michigan shore or the Wisconsin and Illinois shore instead.
Lake Michigan also freezes less than most of the other lakes, so its winter surf season tends to run longer.
Lake Superior
Best setup: West winds when a low passes north of the lake (east shore); northeast winds when a low passes south of it (west shore).
Superior is the biggest, deepest, and northernmost of the lakes, and it produces the most ocean-like waves as a result. In October 2017, a research buoy near Munising recorded a significant wave height of 28.8 feet sustained over an hour. Individual waves in that storm likely reached the 30- to 40-foot range. If you've seen a lake surfing clip you couldn't believe was a lake, it was probably Superior.
Superior's 300-plus miles of fetch run west to east, the same direction as the prevailing weather. When a low passes north of the lake, west winds push waves onto the east shore. When a low passes south of it, northeast winds send waves to the west shore, including Duluth and Minnesota's North Shore.
Superior also picks up north and south swells. There's enough fetch between Marquette and the Ontario shore that the same systems producing north–south swells on Michigan and Huron often produce waves on Superior too.
Lake Huron
Best setup: Similar to Lake Michigan, with north and south winds from passing lows working the main basin.
Huron's main basin runs north to south like Michigan's and reacts to low-pressure systems in much the same way, but with about 100 miles less fetch. Georgian Bay and Saginaw Bay are much smaller than the main basin and have their own wave patterns. I haven't surfed Huron, and there isn't much reliable information about the bays online, so this is the lake I know least.
Lake Erie
Best setup: West and southwest winds, which send waves down the full length of the lake to the eastern end.
Erie runs 241 miles from west-southwest to east-northeast, almost perfectly lined up with the prevailing weather. When the wind blows out of the west or southwest, it has the entire lake to work with and stacks the waves into the eastern end: Buffalo, the New York shoreline, and Presque Isle.
Erie is also the shallowest of the lakes, averaging only 62 feet deep. In strong winds, waves can start breaking out in the open lake before they ever reach shore. For surfers, that means Erie's waves carry less power than the other lakes', and swells fade faster once the wind drops because the shallow lakebed drains their energy. Erie also freezes earliest and most extensively, so its winter season is the shortest.
Erie does have real surf history, though. The Wyldewood Surf Club in Port Colborne, Ontario, has been active since 1965, making it the oldest surf club on the Great Lakes.
Lake Ontario
Best setup: A low-pressure system moving up from the Ohio Valley and tracking north of the lake.
Ontario is the smallest of the five lakes by surface area, with a maximum fetch of 193 miles running east to west, in line with the prevailing weather. Researchers who studied 36 years of extreme wave events on its eastern shore found that the biggest waves come from lows tracking north of the lake out of the Ohio Valley. If you're surfing Ontario, that's the pattern to watch for.
Ontario also breaks the seasonal pattern of the other lakes. Its biggest waves tend to peak in fall and spring, but it's most consistent in winter. It also freezes less than the other lakes, which means a longer winter season.
What is the best city for Great Lakes surfing?
There's no single best surf town on the Great Lakes because the waves move around quite a bit depending on which way the wind blows. However, there are quite a few established scenes around each of the Lakes that are worth noting.
Lake Michigan
Sheboygan, Wisconsin. Known as the "Malibu of the Midwest," with a surf culture going back more than 50 years. It hosted the Dairyland Surf Classic, a long-running freshwater surf contest, every Labor Day weekend for over two decades. EOS Surf & Outdoor, Wisconsin's first surf shop, has boards, rentals, and lessons.
Chicago, Illinois. Surfing is legal at designated city beaches, and the city has a large, active surf community. Nearby Evanston and Northwest Indiana add more options. I've written a full guide to surfing in Chicago.
New Buffalo and St. Joseph, Michigan. Southwest Michigan's surf hub, home to Third Coast Surf Shop.
Grand Haven, Michigan. A classic pier-and-beach surf town on the east shore of the lake, with conditions often compared to Sheboygan's.
Empire, Michigan. On the north end of the lake near Sleeping Bear Dunes. Sleeping Bear Surf & Kayak runs a surf camp that sells out almost immediately.
Lake Superior
Duluth, Minnesota. The center of the Minnesota North Shore scene. The Back Alley, a surf shop and coffee spot, has been the community hub since 2018.
Marquette and Grand Marais, Michigan. Upper Peninsula towns with some of the biggest waves on the lakes. Down Wind Sports in Marquette publishes a useful local break page.
Lake Huron
Kincardine, Ontario. One of the best-known surf towns on Huron. Its main break draws surfers from Toronto, Michigan, and beyond, and has local surf shops nearby.
Lake Erie
Cleveland, Ohio. Home to Edgewater Surf, Ohio's only dedicated surf shop.
Buffalo, New York, and Erie, Pennsylvania. On Erie's eastern end, where west and southwest winds send the biggest waves.
Port Colborne, Ontario. Home of the Wyldewood Surf Club, the oldest surf club on the Great Lakes, active since 1965.
Lake Ontario
Toronto, Ontario. Canada's largest city has a growing surf community. Surf Ontario and Surf the Greats serve the Lake Ontario scene.
How to find clean waves on the Great Lakes
Knowing the surf towns is a good starting point for surfing the Lakes. But if you want to surf regularly, you can't just show up at a known spot and expect waves.
Because the wind and waves arrive together, a small shift in wind angle can make the difference between blown out, glassy, and flat, sometimes at the same spot on the same day. It's common to find a well-known break flat while there are clean waves at a random beach an hour or two down the coast.
Here's how I use the forecast, satellite imagery, and a little geography to find the cleanest waves on any given swell.
1. Start with GLERL
The first thing I do when I’m planning a surf session is look at GLERL about two days out.
I’m checking 2 things:
Whether there will be waves at all
What angle the wind/waves are supposedly coming in at
Two days is about as early as you can reliably predict a swell around here. Further out and the weather forecast isn't reliable enough to plan around.
I don’t count it as locked in until the night before (and if I’m surfing around Chicago, I often don’t make the call until the morning of).
2. Look for protection
On the Lakes, exposed shoreline is usually a churned-up mess when there's any real size. So what you want to find is a corner. Something jutting out that blocks the wind or at the very least, angles it ~90° to the beach.
Just enough to clean up the surface a bit, and give you more organized waves in the lee of a structure.
If the waves are hitting in a place I’ve never surfed before, I open up Google Maps and look at the coastline that's going to be receiving the swell.
I’m looking for anything that sticks out into the water to the direction the wind/waves are coming from. Jetties. Piers. Breakwalls. Points. Peninsulas. River mouths. Harbor entrances. Man-made or natural, doesn't matter. It just has to be at an angle to the primary wind/swell angle.
Structures like this also do a second useful attribute: they catch sand. Anything that interrupts the longshore drift builds a sandbar on one side of it, and sandbars are what turn a wall of windswell into something that actually breaks properly.
My favorite spot in Chicago is a genuine 3-turn left hand point break once it hits chest high for this very reason.
3. Check bathymetry on satellite
A reef near the Wisconsin-Illinois border that I know produces good waves, but only in very specific conditions.
Satellite imagery of lake coastline (or ocean for that matter) is often clear enough to show you what's underneath the water, especially in the shallows.
You're looking for sand buildup, reef, rock, anything that changes the depth. Lighter colored water is shallower. Darker is deeper. A light patch angling out from shore is a sandbar, and the way it's oriented tells you which direction a wave would peel across it.
You're doing rough bathymetry off a free satellite photo. It's imprecise and you'll be wrong plenty. But it's the difference between driving to a random beach and driving to a beach where you have an actual reason to think something might happen.
And every so often you get lucky and the satellite image catches the lake with swell in it. You'll see actual lines running toward the shore, and you can see exactly how they bend and where they focus. When you find one of those, you've basically been handed the answer.
The best surfboards for the Great Lakes
For most surfers, I’ve found the best all-around board for the Great Lakes is usually a midlength between 7'0" and 9'0" that’s a bit thicker and flatter than you’d typically ride in the ocean.
Classic eggs go pretty well on the Lakes.
The main difference you’re solving for here on the Lakes is wave power. Lake waves are weaker, shorter-period, and choppier than the ocean. So you want a board with more surface area, float, and a flatter rocker that will do more of the work for you.
For some people, that means getting a slightly thicker shortboard. For others, it means going from a shortboard to a midlength. But there aren’t any wrong answers or hard and fast rules.
People ride anything and everything here on the Lakes and have a blast doing it.
How I adjust my boards for lake surf
On every lake board I shape for myself, regardless of design or length, I go about ¼" thicker and 1" wider than I would for the ocean. I also carry more foam out toward the rails, which gives a flatter deck.
That added volume sits where it helps you paddle and plane at lower speeds/powers, without making the board feel bloated.
For reference, I'm 6'3" and 210 lbs. On an average lake day, I ride something between 7'6" and 8'0". On the average+ days, when the waves have real size and shape, I'll go down to 6'2"–6'10".
If you're used to shortboards in the ocean, don't feel locked into a midlength. Fish, hybrids, and groveler shapes work well here too, as long as they have the extra volume.
For a deeper dive into shapes, rocker, and the science behind these recommendations, see my guide to choosing a surfboard for the Great Lakes.
Wetsuits for Great Lakes Surfing
The wetsuit you need to surf the Great Lakes depends heavily on which of the Lakes you plan to surf, where on that Lake you plan to surf, and what season you’re planning to surf.
For example, you’ll need a wetsuit pretty much year round on Superior. But the south end of Lake Michigan warms up enough to surf in board shorts in the summer/early Fall.
Here’s a breakdown of what you’ll need by Lake and season:
| Lake | Early fall (Sep–Oct) | Late fall (Nov) | Winter (Dec–Mar) | Spring (Apr–Jun) | Summer (Jul–Aug) |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Superior | 3/2 or 4/3 in Sept; 4/3 or 5/4 hooded with booties and gloves by Oct | 5/4 or 6/5 hooded, 7mm boots and gloves | 5/4 or 6/5 hooded, 7mm boots and gloves | 5/4 or 6/5 hooded through June | 4/3 with booties in July; 3/2 or 4/3 in August |
| Michigan | Springsuit or 3/2 in Sept; 3/2 or 4/3 by Oct | 4/3 or 5/4 hooded, booties, and gloves | 5/4 or 6/5 hooded, 7mm boots and gloves | 5/4 or 6/5 hooded through May; 3/2 or 4/3 by late June | Springsuit or 3/2 in July; boardshorts or a 1mm top in August |
| Huron | Springsuit or 3/2 in Sept; 3/2 or 4/3 by Oct | 4/3 or 5/4 hooded, booties, and gloves | 5/4 or 6/5 hooded, 7mm boots and gloves | 5/4 or 6/5 hooded through May; 3/2 or 4/3 by late June | Springsuit or 3/2 |
| Erie | Boardshorts or a 1mm top in early Sept; 3/2 or 4/3 by Oct | 4/3 or 5/4 hooded, booties, and gloves | 5/4 or 6/5 hooded, 7mm boots and gloves | 5/4 or 6/5 in April; 4/3 or 5/4 in May; springsuit or 3/2 in June | Boardshorts or a 1mm top |
| Ontario | Springsuit or 3/2 in Sept; 3/2 or 4/3 by Oct | 4/3 or 5/4 hooded, booties, and gloves | 5/4 or 6/5 hooded, 7mm boots and gloves | 5/4 or 6/5 hooded through May; 3/2 or 4/3 in June | Springsuit or 3/2 in July; boardshorts or a 1mm top in August |
Based on NOAA's 1995–2025 average surface water temperatures for each lake.
If you only want to buy one wetsuit for the Lakes, I’d recommend a 4/3 with a hood, plus 5mm booties and 3mm gloves. That covers the heart of the fall season and the most consistent stretch of the year, on every lake except Superior.
If you want to surf from December through spring, or on Superior after September, it’s worth investing in 5/4 and 6/5 as well.
Also — one thing to keep in mind about choosing a wetsuit for surfing here is that the windchill is a real factor. When there are waves, the wind is almost always colder than the water. That hood is your friend.
Surf culture and community on the Lakes
Surf culture here is genuinely great. Localism is rare compared to most ocean breaks and people are generally happy to see you in the water. A few spots have tight regular crews, so read the room like you would anywhere else (normal lineup etiquette still applies). But if you show up, introduce yourself, and smile, most people will be surprisingly welcoming.
Occasionally you might run into a knuckle head or two who thinks they’re surfing Pipeline, but they’re the exception not the rule.
The easiest ways to get plugged in are the local surf shops (listed above), your area's Surfrider Foundation chapter, and the Instagram and Facebook groups for your lake/town. Surf shops in particular are often the only community hub for a couple hundred miles, so stop in, talk to people, and buy local when you can.
Surfing the Great Lakes is what you make of it
I've tried to approach this article as neutrally as I can. I'm not trying to convince you the surf on the Great Lakes is epic or pretend it's something it isn't. They’re lakes, after all.
But they do have their days. And if you’re willing to take the time to figure out how they work, I promise, as a once former skeptic — you’ll have fun on those days.
Here’s what I’ll leave you with: there are over ten thousand miles of coastline across the five Great Lakes. And most of those miles are completely unexplored from a surf perspective.
There are great waves waiting to be found here — all it takes is someone willing to put in the time and energy to find them and show up when the swell hits.
Whether that sounds like fun or not is up to you.
Cheers,
Scott