Great Barrier Reef Sea Temperature

Looking to find out what the sea water temperature in Great Barrier Reef is for today and the next few days? Below are data and charts that will give you information about sea temperatures in Great Barrier Reef and nearby locations.

Analysis and forecast for Great Barrier Reef water temperatures

The water temperature in Great Barrier Reef today is higher than the average temperature of 26.24° C (79.23° F) and the temperature on this day last year, 19th May 2023, was 26.87° C (80.37° F).

The chart and table below shows the change in water temperature in Great Barrier Reef over the last 30 days:

The actual nearshore temperatures may vary by several degrees and this can also be heavily affected by weather. Strong winds can cause cold, deep waters to replace the surface waters that had been warmed by the sun, and heavy rain can also reduce the temperature of the sea surface temperature as well.

Water temperature in Great Barrier Reef by month

The chart below shows the monthly average water temperature in Great Barrier Reef.

For more detailed information on how the sea temperature in Great Barrier Reef changes for each month of the year, choose from the months below.

Great Barrier Reef map and nearby water temperatures

The highest temperature in Australia today is 28.6° C (83.48° F) in Darwin. The lowest is in Granton, where the temperature of the water is 14.57° C (58.23° F).

Why measure sea surface temperatures (SST) in Great Barrier Reef?

The ocean covers about 71% of the Earth's surface, and scientists record the sea surface temperature (SST) of locations such as Great Barrier Reef because they want to understand and learn how the ocean communicates with the atomosphere of Earth.

SST is one measure that provides information on the global climate, and it can be used to predict the weather in Great Barrier Reef as well as atmospheric model simulations and to study marine ecosystems in the area.

Data source and citation

Raw data for the calculations made to find the sea surface temperature in Great Barrier Reef comes from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) and their 1/4° daily Optimum Interpolation Sea Surface Temperature.

The water temperature data is constructed by combining observations from different platforms (satellites, ships, buoys, and Argo floats) on a regular global grid. A spatially complete sea surface temperature map is then built by interpolating to fill in gaps in the data.

If you'd like to use any of the information above in the format it is presented, please use the citation tool below.