A real ocean for real places.

You can try, and AI coding assistants are great helpers. But a believable ocean is not one prompt. Getting an environment like this right may cost hundreds in API subscriptions and weeks of work, with painstaking back-and-forth with the chatbot: waves that shoal and break over the seabed, foam, spray and wakes that agree with each other, a sky and weather that match, live forecasts, and real places that line up with the water, with every change tested in a running game. And perfect is never finished, so the engine keeps receiving fixes and improvements, which subscribers get as released updates. A license costs less than those subscriptions alone, and you start from a working ocean on day one. Copying the Open Waves game’s code is not a shortcut either: it is protected by copyright, and the game’s Terms of Service forbid copying, scraping, reverse engineering or decompiling it. Using it without a license is copyright infringement.

Yes. Load a self-contained GLB and the SDK’s FloatingAsset makes it heave, tilt and drift with the sampled waves, with configurable draft, mass and damping. Register it as a hull to push wakes into the water, and add it to the reflection pass so the sea mirrors it. Steering and propulsion stay in your own application code.

Yes. The included adapter places Google Photorealistic 3D Tiles around your water at a latitude, longitude and bearing, and keeps Google’s attribution visible. You use your own Google Maps Platform account, key and billing. The sky follows that location’s real sun path for the hour you choose. Depth and coastline blending at that place come from data you supply; nothing is extracted from Google’s tiles.

It is plain ES modules with TypeScript declarations, tested with three 0.170.0. Anything that gives you the WebGLRenderer, scene, camera and render loop can host it, and React Three Fiber exposes those through its hooks. Use your usual ES-module bundler and a WebGL2 browser.

It is a real-time, shore-oriented wave solver built for believable visuals: crests travel, shoal and refract over the seabed, then break with wind-dependent lips, barrels and foam. It is not a volumetric fluid (CFD) solver, and it is not a validated engineering, forecasting or navigation model.

It needs a WebGL2 browser. Low, medium and high quality presets scale the water grid, foam, particles, shadows and pixel budget. The full renderer makes several GPU passes per frame, so start at medium and choose per device.

The Open Waves game is the live showcase of this engine; beta play requires an invite, which you can request. The documentation covers the full API, and you can ask an integration question before you buy.

No. The license covers proprietary Open Waves code, including the adapter. Google supplies and licenses its own content. You provide your own enabled Google Maps project and authorized API access, pay Google’s usage charges, and comply with its attribution and usage requirements. Open Waves is independent of Google.

Google Photorealistic 3D Tiles are currently unavailable for new integrations associated with EEA billing accounts. The water simulation works independently of Google. See Google’s EEA eligibility guidance.

See Map Tiles API policies and the Google Maps Platform terms.

Forecasts, yes, at no cost: the forecast connector reads MET Norway for weather and wind and NOAA’s WAVEWATCH III wave models for swell. Both are free to use in commercial products with credit and need no account or API key. Keep their credits visible and their fair-use limits (identify your app to MET Norway, cache on your server). On a server the waves cover the open ocean, the Mediterranean and the Baltic; the Black Sea, Caspian Sea and Great Lakes have no wave data. Bathymetry is not included: supply depth data you have permission to use. Google Tiles are scenery and are not used to extract bathymetry.

Yes. The simulation is separate from the optional Google adapter. You can supply your own independently created scene and bathymetry. Google’s service terms still apply whenever you enable Google content.

No. Open Waves remains a separate game and demonstrates the broader technology. Your SDK license covers only the files in your delivered package. The water and environmental rendering modules are included. Game assets, foiling controls, player accounts, multiplayer services and game access are not part of the purchase. Your application supplies its own camera controls and models.

One named product or client application, including its staging environment, updates and versions for other platforms under the same product identity. Separate products and separately branded client projects each need another commercial license. Redistributing the SDK to other developers requires separate written permission.

One-time purchases cover the purchased SDK version, with no future SDK updates. Subscriptions include access to released updates during the paid term. If your subscription ends, you keep using your last downloaded version under the same personal or commercial scope; access to new updates ends. No particular release schedule is promised, and custom integration or ongoing support is not included unless stated on your order.

Personal is $280 for the first year, then $180 paid upfront each year. Personal Monthly is $100 for the first month, then $20 each month. Commercial is $1,800 paid upfront each year per application, or $200 monthly. Subscriptions renew at their selected interval until cancelled; applicable taxes and cancellation details are shown before payment.

Yes, within your license tier. You may ship the included runtime as an embedded part of your finished application, including normal browser delivery. You may not distribute reusable SDK source, a standalone SDK or an asset pack. Third-party open-source components retain their own licenses.