In February 1996 the Canadian Meteorological Centre @CMC) of the Meteorological Service of Canada (MSC), formerly the Atmospheric Environment Service and Program (AES/AEP), implemented regional versions of the third generation global ocean wave model WAM Cycle‐4 (WAM4) in its operational ‐wave forecasting system; one for the north‐east Pacific and one for the north‐west Atlantic. This replaced the first generation Canadian Spectral Ocean Wave Model which had been in operation from December 1990. The 10‐m level wind forcing is obtained from the CMC global atmospheric model for driving the Pacific wave model and from its regional atmospheric model for driving the Atlantic wave model. Analyzed and forecast model wave and wind parameters are evaluated against moored buoy‐measured data in the coastal and shelf regions of the Atlantic and Pacific coasts of North America for the period December 1996 to November 1999. The evaluation is presented in the form of time histories of the seasonal verification statistics, summary tables, and time series of individual model and buoy data for given periods at selected buoy locations in order to highlight seasonal differences in model performance and any impacts due to atmospheric model replacement and grid changes. The results are further compared with the results from the global WAM4 running in operational mode at the European Centre for Medium‐Range Weather Forecasts (ECMWF) and at the Fleet Numerical Meteorology and Oceanography Center (FNMOC) using the same dataseis for the same period and from the recent study based on the National Centers for Environmental Prediction (NCEP) reanalysis data. This is done to assess better the performance of the CMC regional wave models with respect to the global wave models and other regional wave models. The evaluation results indicate that the Pacific ocean has more wind and wave variability and swells than the Atlantic ocean and that there is seasonal variation in this variability. The skill of the CMC regional WAM4 is comparable to that of the global WAM4 in operation at other international wave forecasting centres. The results are also comparable to those obtained using the NCEP 40‐year reanalysis data. The impact on the performance of the wave model resulting from the replacement of the CMC global and regional atmospheric models and also from the changes made to these models is more or less neutral.