About Surfing Life

Surfing Life

Overview

Surfing Life is an Australian surfing magazine published from the Gold Coast, Queensland, and one of the longest-running surf titles in the country. Founded in 1985 as Australia's Surfing Life, it began as what its own anniversary history describes as "the overlooked younger grom" of Australian surf media — the first national surf magazine based in Queensland, produced at Burleigh Heads within sight of the famous point break, at a time when the established titles were based further south. Four decades on, the magazine is still in print: when this profile was verified in October 2026, its website was promoting issue 380, the Spring 2026 edition covering September to November 2026, and digital editions of recent issues were available through the Zinio newsstand platform.

The magazine's promise to readers, carried on its website, is a simple one: "We will make you a better surfer." Its content is organised around what it calls the six pillars of the surfing experience — Surf Travel, Surf Culture, Waves, Technique, Surfboards and Surfers — and each print issue is built around those subjects, mixing surf travel features, wave and destination coverage, technique instruction, surfboard design and technology, profiles of surfers, and historical features under a recurring "Moments" banner. Surfing Life is no longer only a magazine: the brand also operates a website, social media channels, e-newsletters, events and broadcast offshoots including Surfing Life TV and Surfing Life Radio, and in 2022 it was launched as a print magazine in the United States under a licensing partnership.

History

Surfing Life was founded by Peter Morrison, with the first issue appearing in August 1985. Morrison conceived the title as a middle path between the glossy, high-quality surf publications that took months to produce and the cheaper, more frequent newsprint-style publications of the day; the result was a colourful, high-production-value magazine with a witty editorial tone. The first issue featured local Gold Coast surfer Todd Lee getting barrelled at Kirra, and over the following decades its covers carried many of the sport's leading figures, including Shane Herring, Mark Occhilupo, Kelly Slater, Andy Irons, Taj Burrow, Mick Fanning, Joel Parkinson, Julian Wilson and John John Florence. The magazine's 300th issue was marked with a cover image of Joel Parkinson surfing Duranbah at night on a board fitted with green LED lights spelling out the number 300.

The title was the flagship publication of Morrison Media, the Burleigh Heads-based publishing company Morrison built around it, whose other titles over time included Frankie, Smith Journal, White Horses and Slow. Its publishing frequency changed with its fortunes: it began as a quarterly, became bi-monthly in early 1987, and moved to monthly publication in August 1992, remaining a monthly for many years. In 2016 the magazine changed hands, purchased by Craig Sims — Morrison Media's publisher and general manager, and a former owner of Atoll Media, publisher of the South African surf magazine Zigzag — together with his colleagues Graeme Murdoch and Rob Bain. In 2018, looking for a succession path, Sims brought in Ray Bisschop, the magazine's former creative director, to take the title forward; Bisschop has since led Surfing Life as its publisher through his company Ink & Pixel Media Pty Ltd, which remains the publisher identified on the magazine's own website and in current magazine directories.

The magazine celebrated its 40th anniversary in 2025, with its Autumn 2025 issue (number 374) carrying a retrospective interview with founder Peter Morrison, who headed the title for some thirty years from its Burleigh Heads base and who, the magazine reported, now lives in Byron Bay and still surfs several times a week. In its anniversary account, the magazine reflected that it had started in 1985 as an underdog production on Yugambeh-speaking Country on the Gold Coast, disregarded by "The Suits" of the establishment, and had outlasted most of the more than twenty Australian surfing magazines being produced in the 1990s.

Programming and Content

Each issue of Surfing Life is structured around its six pillars. Travel coverage reports on surf destinations in Australia and overseas; Culture covers the lifestyle, history and community around the sport; Waves examines notable breaks and swells; Technique provides instructional content aimed at improving readers' surfing; Surfboards covers board design, shaping and equipment; and Surfers profiles the people of the sport, from world tour professionals to grassroots competitors. Recurring elements include "Moments", a historical section drawing on four decades of surf photography and storytelling, and "The Lineup", the magazine's masthead and contributors page. Recent issues illustrate the mix: the Autumn 2026 issue (number 378) combined a feature on Hawaiian surf photographer Christa Funk, historical material on women surfers of the 1970s, and a question-and-answer section on travel insurance for surfers, while the Autumn 2025 anniversary issue profiled twelve-year-old competitive surfer Leihani Kaloha Zoric alongside its retrospective on the magazine's own history.

Beyond print, the Surfing Life website publishes feature articles drawn from the magazine, and the brand extends into other media: Surfing Life TV, hosted by publisher Ray Bisschop, has been carried on Garage Entertainment, Fetch, Fuel TV and The Surf Network (platforms as described in the magazine's own masthead biography), and Bisschop also hosts Surfing Life Radio with Matt Grainger and the Surfing Life Travel program. In February 2022, New York-based Empire Media Group (EMG) announced that it had added Surfing Life to its portfolio under a deal with Ink & Pixel Media, launching a United States print edition — premiering in April 2022 at a cover price of US$14.99 — with veteran surf commentator Chris Coté appointed editor-at-large. EMG framed the launch as filling the void left when the American magazine Surfer, published for six decades, closed in 2020.

Audience and Reach

Surfing Life addresses surfers rather than the general news audience: committed recreational surfers, competitive surfers and the surf industry itself, in Australia and, through its digital editions and the United States edition, internationally. The magazine does not publish audited circulation figures, and none are claimed here. Its longevity is itself part of the record: it is one of a small number of Australian surf magazines from the print era to have survived the contraction of the category, a point its own anniversary coverage emphasises. Magazine directory Feedspot, in a listing current at the time of writing, credits the title with roughly 118,800 Facebook followers, 122,600 Instagram followers and 71,800 followers on X (formerly Twitter); those figures are the directory's, are not independently audited, and are included only as an indication of the scale of its social following. Its retail presence spans Australian newsagents, subscriptions sold through its own online store, and international digital distribution through Zinio, with print orders dispatched from Queensland to readers in New Zealand, Asia, the Americas and Europe.

Digital Presence

The magazine's website, surfinglife.com.au, serves as its online store, subscription point and digital showcase, carrying feature articles from current issues, back-issue sales and merchandise. Print issues are sold in newsagents and by subscription, and digital editions are distributed through Zinio, where issues including number 374 (Autumn 2025), number 377 (Summer 2025) and number 378 (Autumn 2026) were listed when checked. The brand maintains an active presence on Facebook, Instagram, X and YouTube under the Surfing Life name, and publishes e-newsletters alongside its television and radio extensions. The website states that the magazine now publishes quarterly, organised by season — a change from its long monthly era — with issues numbered sequentially (issue 380 being the Spring 2026 edition).

Ownership and Organisation

Surfing Life is published by Ink & Pixel Media Pty Ltd, the company of Ray Bisschop, who serves as publisher and creative director. Bisschop, described in the magazine's masthead as an award-winning designer and photographer with more than three decades of experience and a surfer of more than four decades' standing, first worked on the title as its creative director before taking it over in the 2018 succession from Craig Sims. The editor-in-chief is Lystra Rose, a Guugu Yimithirr, Birri Gubba and Mua woman with Chinese and Scottish heritage who lives and surfs on the Gold Coast; the magazine and its US licensing partner describe her as the first female editor of a mainstream surf magazine and the first Indigenous Australian to edit a worldwide magazine, and she is also a multi-award-winning author whose debut novel, The Upwelling, collected seven awards (honours as stated in the magazine's own masthead biography and the EMG launch release). The United States edition operates under licence to Empire Media Group. The magazine's editorial base remains the Gold Coast, Queensland, the city recorded for this listing; descriptions of the title as Sydney-based, where they appear in some directories, do not reflect its documented Burleigh Heads and Gold Coast home.

Contact and Availability

Surfing Life is available in print through Australian newsagents and by subscription through its website, where single issues, back issues and merchandise are also sold through its online store; orders are fulfilled from Queensland, with international delivery offered by courier. Digital editions are available worldwide through the Zinio platform. The magazine can be followed through its website at surfinglife.com.au and its official Facebook, Instagram, X and YouTube accounts, and its television and radio programs are accessible through the streaming and broadcast services listed in its own masthead. No public business email address is recorded for this listing.