About Ocean98

Ocean98 is an independent reference to US recreational beaches. It covers 3,699 coastal and Great Lakes beaches in 31 states and territories, organized by state, county and beach.

The site is built from the public EPA BEACON beach attributes report. Those attributes describe each beach: where it is, what water it fronts, whether it is in the BEACH Act program, its monitoring tier, access and reporting frequencies.

What we do not do

Ocean98 does not publish water quality sample results, advisories or closures. We never say whether a beach is safe to swim today. Always check your state or local beach program.

Independence

Ocean98 is not an EPA website and is not affiliated with the EPA, NOAA, any BEACH Act program agency, or the former OCEAN98 education project. Read the history of this domain.

Who runs it

The site is maintained by the Ocean98 editorial team. Questions and corrections: contact us.

Site notes

Microsoft Clarity analytics and Google Search Console and Bing Webmaster verification will be added at go-live. Until then, pages are marked noindex.

See the methodology for how the data is processed.