Tangier tide times

Predictions: Open-Meteo Marine (MeteoFrance SMOC, 0.08° grid) — heights relative to MSL (not chart datum / LAT). Model-derived.

Model-derived from a global ocean grid. Useful indication; expect about ±45 minutes on average vs. a local harmonic gauge, individual stations vary widely. See /methodology for per-region detail. Not for navigation.

Conditions as of 05:00 local time. Refreshes daily.

Predictions: Open-Meteo Marine (MeteoFrance SMOC, 0.08° grid) — heights relative to MSL (not chart datum / LAT). Model-derived. · Not for navigation.

The angler tradition for major/minor fishing windows: major ≈3-hour windows around moon transit and opposition; minor ≈2-hour windows around moonrise and moonset. Times are Africa/Casablanca local. Folk tradition, not a scientific forecast.

Last spring tide on Thu 07 May (range 1.2m). Next spring tide on Wed 13 May (range 1.7m). Next neap on Sat 09 May.

Spring tides cluster around new and full moons (biggest swings). Neap tides land on quarter moons (smallest swings). See the spring tide and neap tide glossary entries for the why.

Tangier stands at the northwest tip of Africa, where the Atlantic Ocean meets the Strait of Gibraltar and the European coast of Spain is 14 kilometres to the north. On a clear day — most days — the white limestone cliffs of Tarifa and the Andalusian hills are visible from the Tangier waterfront without optical aid. Two continents, two seas, one city: the junction is not metaphorical. The geology connects them: the Rif mountains above Tangier and the Betic Cordillera of southern Spain were once the same mountain range before the Strait opened approximately 5.3 million years ago. The tidal regime at Tangier is semidiurnal Atlantic — two highs and two lows per day — with a mean range of approximately 1.5 metres. Spring range reaches around 2.0 metres. The tide here is the full Atlantic signal; the range attenuates rapidly eastward through the Strait toward the Mediterranean. Tidal currents in the Strait narrows reach 2 to 3 knots, running east on the flood (surface Atlantic water flowing into the Mediterranean) and west on the ebb, though the deep two-layer exchange is more complex — denser saltier Mediterranean water flows west beneath the eastward surface current continuously. The port of Tangier handles ferry traffic to Tarifa (35 minutes), Algeciras (1.5 hours), and Sète in France. Tangier Med, the container port 40 kilometres east, has become one of the largest ports in Africa and the transit hub for Europe-Africa containerised trade. The old port in the centre of the city retains the medina quarter above it — the Grand Socco, the kasbah on the hilltop, the narrow derbs of the medina descending to the waterfront. The medina of Tangier is the historic quarter above the port: the Petit Socco at its centre, the kasbah at its highest point with views over both the Atlantic and the Strait. The American Legation — the first US diplomatic property overseas, established 1821 and still in use as a museum and cultural institute — is in the medina. Tangier was an International Zone from 1923 to 1956, administered by a consortium of European powers and Morocco; the period produced a city with an unusually mixed architectural and cultural character. The legacy is visible in the architecture of the Ville Nouvelle (French), the Spanish quarter around the Gran Teatro Cervantes, and the consular buildings near the seafront. Playa Merkala, on the Atlantic side northwest of the city, and the beaches of the Tangier Bay (on the Mediterranean side) have different character. The Atlantic beaches pick up northwest swell directly; the bay beaches are calmer, in the shelter of Cap Spartel to the northwest. Cap Spartel itself — where the Atlantic and Mediterranean meet — is 14 kilometres west of the city and marked by a 19th-century lighthouse built by the international powers that administered the coast. Fishing from the corniche and the Merkala beach targets bream, bass, and occasional mullet; the tidal current around Cap Spartel is significant on spring tides and affects fishing timing. The mixing of Atlantic and Mediterranean water at the cap creates productive feeding conditions for pelagic fish. Tide predictions on this page come from Open-Meteo Marine, a gridded global ocean model. Accuracy is typically within plus or minus 45 minutes on timing and 0.2 to 0.3 metres on height. For authoritative official predictions for Tangier and the Strait, consult SHOMAR — Service Hydrographique et Océanographique de la Marine.