Waves - Seismic Waveform Analysis
v5.0 · Nov 2025 · formerly eqWave
The world’s best earthquake waveform viewer. Pick P & S arrivals across dozens of stations in a single view, see frequency spectra and spectrograms, convert between velocity, acceleration and displacement, and locate earthquakes with 1D velocity models.
Developed by the Seismology Research CentreA division of ESS Earth Sciences · Richmond, VictoriaScreenshots & tutorials
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What Waves does
Built for earthquake analysis
Multi-station phase picking
Pick P & S arrivals from dozens of seismograph stations in a single view, with keyboard shortcuts for a fast workflow.
Location & magnitude
eqFocus algorithms with multi-layer 1D velocity models and map-visualised solutions — simple enough for teaching.
Spectra & spectrograms
FFT and PSD plots — overlay Peterson NLNM/NHNM noise curves — plus spectrograms with selectable colour schemes.
Convert, filter, rotate
Swap between velocity, acceleration and displacement; filter by frequency selection, rotate horizontals, trim and export.
Blast & vibration reports
One-click PDF reports with time series, FFT frequency plots and USBM RI8507 amplitude/frequency charts.
Open data formats
Reads MiniSEED, PC-SUDS, SAC, SEG-2 and Gecko histograms; station metadata from any FDSN StationXML server.
Waves 5.0 is a major overhaul of the interface — new colour schemes, sharper graphics, and quality-of-life fixes throughout.
- Dark Mode as an alternative colour scheme
- Colour-coded waveforms to distinguish relative amplitude, as on Seismosphere
- User-selectable spectrogram colour schemes for visual accessibility
- Reads miniSEED encoded with 32-bit integer sample data
- Distance & magnitude estimates for single stations with P & S picks
- Choose your own FDSN server for StationXML — no longer IRIS-only
- Network code displayed alongside station code
- Toggle station sort order straight from the toolbar
- Improved responsiveness and clarity of graphical elements
- No more pop-up advertisement at startup
Licensing
Free to download and use
If you use Waves for your operations or research, the SRC would appreciate a shout-out in your published acknowledgements.
- Platforms
- Windows · macOS · Intel · macOS · Apple Silicon · Ubuntu Linux
- Formats
- MiniSEED · PC-SUDS · SAC · SEG-2 · Gecko histograms · FDSN StationXML
- Release
- v5.0 · Nov 2025
- Licence
- Free to download and use
- Developed by
- Developed by the Seismology Research Centre · A division of ESS Earth Sciences · Richmond, Victoria
Support
Questions about Waves?
Talk to an ESS engineer about formats, licensing, or the instruments behind the data.