ORBIT

How Accurate Is ORBIT's Forecast?

We record what ORBIT forecasts, wait for the date to pass, compare it against what actually happened, and repeat that thousands of times. Here's what that actually shows — no invented numbers.

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Forecast vs Actual

Pick a region and a past date to see exactly what was forecast vs what happened.

How We Calculate This

  1. Every day, ORBIT's real 7-day wind and swell forecast is captured and locked in — it's never edited after the fact.
  2. Once each forecast date arrives, we check it against the wind actually measured that day by the Bureau of Meteorology's coastal weather stations (Norah Head, Sydney Harbour, Bellambi).
  3. We compare the two and calculate the error — for wind direction, using correct circular math (350° vs 10° is a 20° error, not 340°).
  4. Numbers only appear once there's enough verified data to mean something — otherwise you'll see "collecting data" instead of a made-up figure.

Covers wind speed and direction against BOM measurements. Swell is still checked against a model archive until we have measured buoy data.

Why the numbers reset on 1 October 2026. Until then we scored ORBIT against a model archive rather than real measurements, and it made ORBIT look accurate to within about a knot. When we checked against BOM's stations, the real gap was often 8 to 10 knots, with ORBIT reading too light on sea-breeze days. So we threw those numbers out and started again against measured wind. The figures above are the honest ones, and they'll fill in as the days are checked.