The journal covers instrument development, in situ observations, remote sensing, data assimilation, laboratory, numerical and theoretical studies of: Air-Sea Fluxes; Surface Waves; Sea Ice; Internal Waves; Turbulence and Mixing; Temperature, Salinity and Density Fields; Ocean Currents and Eddies; Tides, Equatorial Waves and Mid-latitudes Waves; Chemical, Biochemical and Biological Distributions and Transport; Chemical, Biochemical, Biological and Physical Interactions; Ocean Productivity; Ocean Ecology; Sediment Processes; Sea Level; Operational Oceanography.

The coverage of the journal is worldwide and includes the deep ocean, the shelf seas and inland seas, now, in the past and the future. By publishing articles freely on the web, the journal aims to make the latest oceanographic developments rapidly available to all people wherever they are. By encouraging discussion of each paper, it aims to raise standards, improve the flow of information, identify the limits to our present understanding and stimulate further effective oceanographic research.