Tides usually occur four times a day at most coasts: two high tides and two low tides in roughly a 24‑hour 50‑minute “lunar day.”

Basic tide timing

  • Most coastal areas experience:
    • 2 high tides per lunar day.
    • 2 low tides per lunar day.
  • Because a lunar day is about 24 hours 50 minutes, consecutive high tides are about 12 hours 25 minutes apart, and it takes about 6 hours 12 minutes for water to change from high to low (or low to high).

Local variations

  • Some coasts have only one high and one low tide per day (a single tidal cycle), due to local geography and how ocean basins resonate with the tidal forces.
  • Exact times and heights also change over the month, with especially large “spring tides” around full and new moons and smaller “neap tides” in between.

Super‑short answer

In most places, tides occur about every 6 hours (switching from high to low or low to high), with two full high–low cycles each lunar day.

Information gathered from public forums or data available on the internet and portrayed here.