How to choose which model to use

OpenDrift contains a few specific models for several applications such as oil drift, search and rescue and fish eggs.

The table below shows an overview of the advection processes within the main models:

Model	Move with currents	Direct wind drift	Stokes drift	Vertical motion
OceanDrift	yes	yes (optional wind_drift_factor)	yes	advection, turbulence
OpenOil	yes	yes (optional wind_drift_factor)	yes	wave entrainment, turbulence, buoyancy, advection
Leeway	yes	yes, at an angle. category-based empirical empirical wind_drift_factor	implicit in wind	no
PelagicEgg	yes	no	yes	turbulence, buoyancy, advection
PlastDrift	yes	no	yes	empirical-statistical depth, exponential decrease with depth, depending on turbulence/wind
OpenBergOld	yes	yes	implicit in wind	no

Direct wind drift is only applied to elements/particles at the very surface. Elements may be seeded with a user defined property wind_drift_factor (default is typically 0.02, i.e. 2%) which determines the fraction of wind speed at which elements will be advected.

Surface Stokes Drift must be obtained from a wave model, whereas the depth dependency is parameterised according to Breivik et al. (2014).

Vertical entrainment, mixing and refloating is largely following Röhrs et al. (2018)

All models are subclasses of OpenDrift, or OceanDrift and inherits all core functionality from there. The OpenDrift class itself has no specification of advection or other processes, and can thus not be used directly.