Is Holly Beach good for beginners?

Holly Beach is rated Beginner: the median wave is 0.5 m and 68% of days are mellow (0.4 to 1.2 m).

How warm is the water at Holly Beach?

The yearly mean sea temperature is 24°C, so most of the year you want a rash vest or 2 mm.

World › United States of America › Louisiana › Holly Beach

Holly Beach 15.8

#5716 of 5756 surf spots in the world · 🇺🇸 United States of America · Louisiana · near Port Arthur

Needs the right swell, wind is the enemy here, gentle enough to learn.

Warm waterBeginner

Surf score15.8 /100

Surfable days34% of the year

Clean days0% groundswell + friendly wind

Groundswell0% period 11 s+

Typical size0.5 m 1.6 ft median

Water24°C a rash vest or 2 mm

Best time to surf Holly Beach

It rarely works. The nearest airport is GLS (146 km) and the nearest town is Port Arthur (47 km).

Month	Surfable	Clean	Size	Water	Suit
Jan	35%	0%	0.5 m	16°C	4/3
Feb	45%	0%	0.5 m	15°C	4/3
Mar	43%	0%	0.6 m	21°C	2mm
Apr	57%	0%	0.6 m	24°C	vest
May	55%	0%	0.6 m	26°C	boardies
Jun	39%	0%	0.5 m	29°C	boardies
Jul	14%	0%	0.5 m	31°C	boardies
Aug	6%	0%	0.4 m	31°C	boardies
Sep	19%	0%	0.4 m	30°C	boardies
Oct	31%	0%	0.5 m	27°C	boardies
Nov	27%	0%	0.5 m	22°C	2mm
Dec	35%	0%	0.5 m	17°C	3/2

What is under Holly Beach

Eight kilometres out along its swell window the sea floor is still shallow, 23 m.

Depth 8 km out23 m

Depth 4 km out18 m

Measured, not estimated: NOAA ETOPO 2022 global relief at 15 arc-seconds, about 460 m per cell, sampled along this spot’s own swell window. At that scale the survey sees passes and channels; it cannot see a reef ledge, so nothing here is said about how the wave breaks.

Why 15.8

Seven parts, each normalised 0 to 1 and multiplied by its weight; the sum is scaled so the best spot in the world scores 100. Wave quality and what the spot does on its best days carry more than half of it, which is what separates this from a ranking of where the water is warm.

Wave quality 34.7%

2.3

Best days 22.4%

0.3

Clean days 18.4%

0.0

Consistency 10.2%

3.4

Season spread 4.1%

0.4

Water comfort 6.1%

4.8

Access 4.1%

2.5

The detail

Faces 180° with 47% open water around it. Friendly morning wind 53% of days. Mean peak period 4.6 s. Days over 3 m: 0%. On its best tenth of days it reaches 0.8 m, with a peak period of 6 s. Mellow days (0.4 to 1.2 m): 68%. Months that work: 2 of 12. Coordinates 29.771, -93.462 (OpenStreetMap).

What it costs to be here

Living here

€2,000/ month

typically €1,760 – €2,240

Rent, one bedroom€1,050

Groceries€420

Eating out€240

Getting around€140

Phone + internet€150

Renting by the month, cooking most days, local transport.

One month here

€3,900/ month

typically €3,430 – €4,370

Somewhere to stay€2,300

Eating out€820

Car, transfers, fuel€530

Data + extras€250

Short stays, eating out, a car or transfers.

49% cheaper if you live here instead of visiting

Estimate: World Bank PPP price level for United States of America (2025, United States = 1.00) applied to a fixed surfer basket, then adjusted for how remote the spot is. Your own number moves with the season and how you live.

Our own project · Sumba, Indonesia

Own a cabin on a surf coast in Sumba

Sumba has eight spots in this ranking, the best of them inside the world top 50. A cabin is €11,500. The land it sits on is separate, from €6,500 (€9,950 oceanfront), on an 80-year lease that extends at the end. Water, septic and electricity are another €6,500, and furniture is on top, so a finished cabin lands around €28,000 plus the land, payable in instalments.

Eco Beach City is run by the same people as SurfRanking, so treat this as our own advert, not a recommendation. It is an off-plan property in Indonesia: take your own legal and financial advice before paying anything.

See the cabin

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