USGS Water Services

aid: usgs-water
name: USGS Water Services
description: The U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) National Water Information System (NWIS) exposes a suite of REST APIs providing
  access to real-time and historical water data from over 1.5 million monitoring locations across the United States and territories.
  The legacy WaterServices APIs (being decommissioned in early 2027) and the next-generation api.waterdata.usgs.gov OGC-compliant
  APIs together cover streamflow, groundwater levels, water quality, site metadata, and statistical summaries. All services
  are free, publicly funded, and require no authentication for standard use; API keys are available at no cost for higher
  rate-limit access.
type: Index
image: https://kinlane-images.s3.amazonaws.com/shared/apis-json/apis-json-logo.jpg
access: Public
created: '2026-06-13'
modified: '2026-06-13'
position: Producer
url: https://raw.githubusercontent.com/api-evangelist/usgs-water/refs/heads/main/apis.yml
specificationVersion: '0.19'
tags:
- Water
- Streamflow
- Groundwater
- Water Quality
- Hydrology
- Environmental
- USGS
- NWIS
- Government
- Open Data
- OGC
apis:
- aid: usgs-water:instantaneous-values
  name: USGS Instantaneous Values Service
  description: Provides near real-time water data — streamflow, gage height, temperature, specific conductance, and hundreds
    of other parameters — from thousands of USGS monitoring sites. Values are typically recorded every 15 minutes and transmitted
    hourly. Data is available from October 1, 2007 onwards and is marked provisional until reviewed.
  humanURL: https://waterservices.usgs.gov/docs/instantaneous-values/instantaneous-values-details/
  baseURL: https://waterservices.usgs.gov/nwis/iv/
  tags:
  - Real-Time
  - Streamflow
  - Gage Height
  - Water Parameters
  - Time Series
  properties:
  - type: Documentation
    url: https://waterservices.usgs.gov/docs/instantaneous-values/instantaneous-values-details/
  - type: Website
    url: https://waterservices.usgs.gov/
- aid: usgs-water:daily-values
  name: USGS Daily Values Service
  description: Returns historical summarized daily hydrologic data (mean, median, maximum, minimum) for streams, lakes, estuaries,
    and wells. Many sites have more than 10 years of record. Supports WaterML 1.1, WaterML 2.0, RDB (tab-delimited), and JSON
    output formats.
  humanURL: https://waterservices.usgs.gov/docs/dv-service/daily-values-service-details/
  baseURL: https://waterservices.usgs.gov/nwis/dv/
  tags:
  - Daily Values
  - Historical Data
  - Streamflow
  - Hydrology
  - WaterML
  properties:
  - type: Documentation
    url: https://waterservices.usgs.gov/docs/dv-service/daily-values-service-details/
  - type: Website
    url: https://waterservices.usgs.gov/
- aid: usgs-water:site-service
  name: USGS Site Service
  description: Searches and retrieves metadata for millions of USGS hydrologic data collection sites including streams, springs,
    wells, lakes, reservoirs, estuaries, and glaciers. Filtering options include site number, state, HUC, bounding box, county,
    site type, and parameter codes. Outputs include tab-delimited, KML, and GeoJSON.
  humanURL: https://waterservices.usgs.gov/docs/site-service/site-service-details/
  baseURL: https://waterservices.usgs.gov/nwis/site/
  tags:
  - Site Metadata
  - Monitoring Locations
  - Geospatial
  - NWIS
  properties:
  - type: Documentation
    url: https://waterservices.usgs.gov/docs/site-service/site-service-details/
  - type: Website
    url: https://waterservices.usgs.gov/
- aid: usgs-water:statistics-service
  name: USGS Statistics Service
  description: Retrieves daily, monthly, or annual statistics (mean, minimum, maximum, median, and percentiles P05–P95) computed
    from approved historical time-series data. Supports up to 10 sites per request and returns data in RDB tab-delimited format.
  humanURL: https://waterservices.usgs.gov/docs/statistics/statistics-details/
  baseURL: https://waterservices.usgs.gov/nwis/stats/
  tags:
  - Statistics
  - Percentiles
  - Historical
  - Streamflow
  - Approved Data
  properties:
  - type: Documentation
    url: https://waterservices.usgs.gov/docs/statistics/statistics-details/
  - type: Website
    url: https://waterservices.usgs.gov/
- aid: usgs-water:groundwater-levels
  name: USGS Groundwater Levels Service
  description: Provides historical manually-recorded groundwater level measurements from USGS wells and monitoring sites.
    Returns depth-to-water and water-level-above-datum values in JSON or RDB format. For automated real-time groundwater data,
    the Instantaneous Values Service should be used.
  humanURL: https://waterservices.usgs.gov/docs/groundwater-levels/groundwater-levels-details/
  baseURL: https://waterservices.usgs.gov/nwis/gwlevels/
  tags:
  - Groundwater
  - Water Levels
  - Wells
  - Aquifers
  - Historical
  properties:
  - type: Documentation
    url: https://waterservices.usgs.gov/docs/groundwater-levels/groundwater-levels-details/
  - type: Website
    url: https://waterservices.usgs.gov/
- aid: usgs-water:ogc-continuous-values
  name: USGS OGC Continuous Values API
  description: Next-generation OGC API compliant service (api.waterdata.usgs.gov) providing real-time continuous sensor measurements
    including streamflow, gage height, and hundreds of other parameters. Implements OGC API – Features standard with CQL2
    filtering, spatial bounding-box queries, and temporal filtering. Supports JSON, HTML, CSV, and JSON-LD output formats.
  humanURL: https://api.waterdata.usgs.gov/docs/
  baseURL: https://api.waterdata.usgs.gov/ogcapi/v0/collections/continuous
  tags:
  - Real-Time
  - OGC
  - Streamflow
  - Continuous Data
  - Next Generation
  properties:
  - type: Documentation
    url: https://api.waterdata.usgs.gov/docs/
  - type: OpenAPI
    url: https://api.waterdata.usgs.gov/ogcapi/v0/openapi?f=json
  - type: Website
    url: https://api.waterdata.usgs.gov/
- aid: usgs-water:ogc-daily-values
  name: USGS OGC Daily Values API
  description: OGC API compliant service for historical summarized daily water data with derived statistics. Part of the next-generation
    USGS Water Data API platform replacing the legacy WaterServices (slated for decommission in early 2027). Supports CQL2
    filtering, geospatial queries, and multiple output formats.
  humanURL: https://api.waterdata.usgs.gov/docs/
  baseURL: https://api.waterdata.usgs.gov/ogcapi/v0/collections/daily
  tags:
  - Daily Values
  - OGC
  - Historical
  - Next Generation
  properties:
  - type: Documentation
    url: https://api.waterdata.usgs.gov/docs/
  - type: OpenAPI
    url: https://api.waterdata.usgs.gov/ogcapi/v0/openapi?f=json
  - type: Website
    url: https://api.waterdata.usgs.gov/
- aid: usgs-water:ogc-monitoring-locations
  name: USGS OGC Monitoring Locations API
  description: OGC API compliant service providing location details, geographic data, and site identifiers for USGS monitoring
    stations. Returns rich metadata including site type, drainage area, altitude, aquifer codes, and active parameter inventory.
  humanURL: https://api.waterdata.usgs.gov/docs/
  baseURL: https://api.waterdata.usgs.gov/ogcapi/v0/collections/monitoring-locations
  tags:
  - Monitoring Locations
  - Site Metadata
  - Geospatial
  - OGC
  properties:
  - type: Documentation
    url: https://api.waterdata.usgs.gov/docs/
  - type: OpenAPI
    url: https://api.waterdata.usgs.gov/ogcapi/v0/openapi?f=json
  - type: Website
    url: https://api.waterdata.usgs.gov/
- aid: usgs-water:water-quality-portal
  name: Water Quality Portal (WQP) API
  description: A cooperative service sponsored by USGS and EPA providing access to water quality data from over 400 agencies
    including USGS NWIS and EPA WQX. Endpoints cover monitoring sites, chemistry results, biological metrics, activity data,
    and detection limits. Supports spatial, temporal, characteristic, and organizational filters. Output formats include CSV,
    TSV, XLSX, XML, GeoJSON, KML, and KMZ.
  humanURL: https://www.waterqualitydata.us/webservices_documentation/
  baseURL: https://www.waterqualitydata.us/data/
  tags:
  - Water Quality
  - EPA
  - Chemistry
  - Biology
  - Monitoring
  - Multi-Agency
  properties:
  - type: Documentation
    url: https://www.waterqualitydata.us/webservices_documentation/
  - type: Website
    url: https://www.waterqualitydata.us/
- aid: usgs-water:statistics-next-gen
  name: USGS Water Data Statistics API
  description: Next-generation statistics API at api.waterdata.usgs.gov providing computed statistical summaries for USGS
    water time series. Part of the platform replacing the legacy WaterServices statistics endpoint.
  humanURL: https://api.waterdata.usgs.gov/statistics/v0/docs
  baseURL: https://api.waterdata.usgs.gov/statistics/v0/
  tags:
  - Statistics
  - Next Generation
  - Time Series
  properties:
  - type: Documentation
    url: https://api.waterdata.usgs.gov/statistics/v0/docs
  - type: Website
    url: https://api.waterdata.usgs.gov/
common:
- type: Website
  url: https://waterservices.usgs.gov/
- type: Website
  url: https://api.waterdata.usgs.gov/
- type: Documentation
  url: https://waterservices.usgs.gov/docs/
- type: Documentation
  url: https://api.waterdata.usgs.gov/docs/
- type: Signup
  url: https://api.waterdata.usgs.gov/signup/
- type: PrivacyPolicy
  url: https://www.doi.gov/privacy
- type: TermsOfService
  url: https://www.usgs.gov/information-policies-and-instructions/copyrights-and-credits
- type: Contact
  url: mailto:wdfn@usgs.gov
- type: StatusPage
  url: https://waterservices.usgs.gov/test-tools/
- type: Plans
  url: https://raw.githubusercontent.com/api-evangelist/usgs-water/refs/heads/main/plans/usgs-water-plans.yml
- type: RateLimits
  url: https://raw.githubusercontent.com/api-evangelist/usgs-water/refs/heads/main/rate-limits/usgs-water-rate-limits.yml
- type: FinOps
  url: https://raw.githubusercontent.com/api-evangelist/usgs-water/refs/heads/main/finops/usgs-water-finops.yml
maintainers:
- FN: Kin Lane
  email: kin@apievangelist.com