Washington's king tides for the 2026-27 season peak twice: Christmas week, December 23-28, 2026, at La Push and Port Townsend, and January 24-26, 2027 in Seattle. Per NOAA predictions the state's highest high is 13.09 ft MLLW at Seattle (station 9447130) on Monday, January 25 at 7:16 AM. The deepest low you can see in daylight belongs to the outer coast: -1.97 ft at La Push (9442396) on December 23 at dusk.
What makes a tide "king"
Nothing official. NOAA's definition: "A King Tide is a non-scientific term people often use to describe exceptionally high tides." The mechanism behind the biggest ones is a perigean spring tide — in NOAA's words, one that "occurs when the moon is either new or full and closest to Earth." That lineup is not rare: "Typically between 6-8 times each year, the new or full moon coincides closely in time with the perigee of the moon." During any spring tide, "high tides are higher and low tides are lower than average" — the swing works both ways, which is why this page has two halves: the highs people photograph, and the question of whether the matching lows are worth anything.
The same season at all twelve stations we compute is in King Tides 2026 & 2027 Dates. This page is Washington only, and Washington needs its own page because the two halves come apart here in a way they don't in Oregon.
The Washington king tide dates: the season's highest highs
The Christmas run carries the coast and the northern Sound; Seattle's peak waits for late January. Notice the clocks as much as the heights: Puget Sound's biggest highs arrive with morning coffee, between 5:49 and 8:22 AM, while La Push crests near midday — much friendlier light for a photograph.
| Station (NOAA id) | Highest predicted high | Date | Time of high | Next highest |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Seattle (9447130) | 13.09 ft | Mon, Jan 25, 2027 | 7:16 AM | 13.04 ft Jan 24 · 13.01 ft Dec 26 · 13.00 ft Jan 26 · 13.00 ft Dec 27 |
| Port Townsend (9444900) | 9.96 ft | Sat, Dec 26, 2026 | 7:08 AM | 9.95 ft Dec 25 · 9.91 ft Dec 27 · 9.83 ft Dec 28 · 9.81 ft Dec 24 |
| La Push (9442396) | 11.01 ft | Thu, Dec 24, 2026 | 11:43 AM | 10.91 ft Dec 25 · 10.85 ft Dec 23 · 10.79 ft Nov 25 · 10.78 ft Jan 22 |
Each station's five highest predicted highs of the October 2026 – March 2027 season. Computed 2026-09-04 from NOAA predictions, heights in ft MLLW, times local. Predictions are astronomical forecasts, not observations: a winter low-pressure system or a strong onshore wind can push the actual water level well above these numbers — which is exactly what the photos are for.
Those photos are the point of the Washington King Tides Program, a citizen-science project run by Washington Sea Grant (part of the University of Washington's College of the Environment). Participants photograph waterfront locations in their communities during king tides — ideally spots whose ordinary high tide they know — so the images document where a future, higher sea might reach. Photos go in through the MyCoast website or app. When this page was written on September 4, 2026, the program page had not yet posted 2026-27 photo dates; the NOAA-predicted highs above are the days to watch for.
The honest half: Puget Sound's deep lows are at night
In Oregon, the king-tide highs drain to the season's deepest daylight lows the same afternoon. In Puget Sound they don't. At Seattle (9447130), November and December 2026 have zero daylight low-tide windows — 21 lows below +1.0 ft each month, every one of them after dark. Port Townsend (9444900) is the same: 22 sub-+1.0 ft lows in each of those months, none with usable light.
It isn't that winter water is shallow here; it's that the deep lows and the daylight stop overlapping. Seattle's five deepest daylight lows of the entire king season all crowd into February and March 2027, and the deepest is just -0.65 ft (Thursday, March 25 at 1:45 PM). Compare July: on July 14, 2026, Seattle's daylight low reached -3.80 ft at 11:20 AM — over three feet more reef than anything the king season will show you before sunset. If you tidepool on Puget Sound, king tide season is spectator season, and your dates are in summer. The Puget Sound low tide calendar has the full year's picture.
| Station | Deepest daylight low, Oct 2026 – Mar 2027 | Date | Time of low | Daylight in window | Score |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Seattle (9447130) | -0.65 ft | Thu, Mar 25, 2027 | 1:45 PM | 175 min | 57 (Fair) |
| Port Townsend (9444900) | -1.64 ft | Wed, Feb 17, 2027 | 7:06 PM | 57 min | 55 (Fair) |
| La Push (9442396) | -1.97 ft | Wed, Dec 23, 2026 | 6:03 PM | 39 min | 59 (Fair) |
Computed 2026-09-04 from NOAA predictions. Heights in ft MLLW, times local. Score is Tidewindow's 0-100 rating of depth, daylight and timing; the methodology page shows the formula.
Port Townsend sits between the two regimes: its -1.64 ft on February 17 is real depth, but the low itself lands at 7:06 PM and only 57 minutes of the window are lit. Its most usable king-season window is shallower — -0.77 ft on Monday, February 15, 2027 at 5:04 PM, with 158 daylight minutes, scoring 65 (Good).
The exception: La Push keeps daylight windows all winter
The outer coast never goes fully dark. While Seattle and Port Townsend post zero daylight windows in November and December, La Push keeps 6-7 a month through the winter, and its king-season lows have real depth:
| Date | Low (ft MLLW) | Time of low | Walkable window | Arrive by | Daylight in window | Score |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Wed, Dec 23, 2026 | -1.97 | 6:03 PM | 3:50 – 8:25 PM | 5:03 PM | 39 min | 59 (Fair) |
| Fri, Jan 22, 2027 | -1.96 | 6:35 PM | 4:25 – 8:45 PM | 5:35 PM | 38 min | 63 (Good) |
| Tue, Nov 24, 2026 | -1.84 | 6:14 PM | 4:00 – 8:30 PM | 5:14 PM | 32 min | 56 (Fair) |
| Thu, Jan 21, 2027 | -1.82 | 5:50 PM | 3:40 – 8:05 PM | 4:50 PM | 82 min | 63 (Good) |
| Tue, Dec 22, 2026 | -1.45 | 5:15 PM | 3:10 – 7:25 PM | 4:15 PM | 79 min | 55 (Fair) |
La Push's five lowest daylight lows of the season, computed 2026-09-04 from NOAA predictions for station 9442396. Same conventions as above.
Read the daylight column before the depth column. December 23 is the deepest water of the season, but only 39 of its minutes are lit; January 21 gives up 0.15 ft of depth for more than twice the light, and it is the better trip. That is the winter pattern: show up when the window opens, mid-to-late afternoon, and work the falling tide while you can still see — don't wait for the low itself. No window in these tables reaches the Great band; Washington's king season is played in the Fair-to-Good range, in the last hours of light.
Winter lows come with winter ocean, and the outer coast is the most exposed shore in the state. Predictions are not observations, and swell can erase a calm-water window entirely; what a sneaker wave is, and what the official agencies say about it, is in What is a sneaker wave?.
Where to stand
- La Push (9442396): Second Beach and Third Beach — the La Push and Second Beach guide, which leads with the current access advisories for the Mora/Rialto side.
- Port Townsend (9444900): Fort Worden State Park, North Beach, Glass Beach — the Port Townsend and Fort Worden guide.
- Seattle (9447130): Alki Beach, Constellation Park, Golden Gardens — the Seattle, Alki and Constellation Park guide, and the statewide picture in Best tide pools in Washington.
How to keep these dates
They are months away, which is how they get lost. The Tide Window Finder lists every upcoming daylight window at all three Washington stations with its arrive-by time, and takes a ZIP code to pick the nearest station (the lookup runs in your browser; nothing is sent). The Trip Picker will chain the December 22-23 and January 21-22 La Push windows into a best consecutive-days answer if your travel dates are flexible. And the station picker at the end of this page hands you a calendar feed that puts every Good-or-better daylight window in your calendar app with an arrive-by alarm — subscribe once, and the whole season above is inside its range.