USGS WaterFlow

Live water flow updates for paddlers, anglers, and anyone who watches a river. Tap a station, save it, add a widget, and check the level at a glance.

WaterFlow turns every USGS streamgauge in the country into a pocket-sized field guide for moving water.

It was built for one moment: you wake up, glance at your phone, and the river is already there. The Home Screen widget shows live flows for the gauges you watch — no app to open, no websites, just the number that decides your day.

Behind the widget is the full field guide: real-time flow rates (cubic feet per second), gauge height, water temperature, and the local NOAA forecast — drawn straight from the official sources, no middleman.

— HOME-SCREEN WIDGET — The reason WaterFlow exists. Pin the gauges you watch and wake up to their current flow: big clear numbers with a seven-day sparkline each. Small, Medium, and Large layouts, plus lock-screen accessory widgets so even a glance at the clock tells you whether the river came up overnight.

— BY STATE — Pick a state, see every active gauge in it, sort by flow, name, or distance.

— NEARBY — Use your location to find every gauge within a configurable radius. Skunked? Try the next basin over.

— FAVORITES — Save the gauges you watch most. Each favorite shows the current flow and a sparkline of the last seven days.

— MAP — Every USGS gauge in the country on one map. Quiet water-blue ripple pins read at a glance: the rings show how much water is moving, and the ink fades as a reading ages. Tap a pin for a quick read; tap through for the full station detail.

— STATION DETAIL — One big, clear number carries the current reading, with simple charts underneath for the last seven days. Flow, gauge height, water temperature, and the NOAA forecast for that spot — nothing between you and the water.

— FLOW ALERTS — Set a low or high flow threshold on any gauge. Get a push notification when the river crosses the line — first run, peak, drop, whatever you set.

— DATA YOU CAN TRUST — WaterFlow doesn't make up numbers. It reads them straight from the U.S. Geological Survey's Water Services API and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration's forecast service. If the gauge is offline or the reading is old, the app tells you.

— WHO IT'S FOR — Built for the people who actually go outside before checking conditions: anglers, kayakers, rafters, paddleboarders, swimmers, photographers, naturalists, and anyone who cares whether the river is rising or falling tonight.

— PRIVACY — WaterFlow doesn't track you. Your location is used only to find nearby gauges and never leaves your device beyond the rough query USGS needs to return results. Your favorites and alert settings live in your phone's secure storage, shared only with the WaterFlow widget. No analytics, no advertising, no third-party SDKs.

Data: U.S. Geological Survey Water Services (waterservices.usgs.gov) and the National Weather Service (weather.gov). WaterFlow is not affiliated with either agency.