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Native hydrology tools in QGIS 4.4 – thank you to our crowdfunding donors
27/10/2026
On 30 October 2026, QGIS 4.4 is released, and for the first time it ships with native hydrology tools in QGIS core. No extra providers to install, no dependency headaches: flow direction, Strahler order, channel networks, drainage basins, upslope areas and thin plate spline interpolation are right there in the Processing Toolbox.
This did not happen by itself. It was made possible by a crowdfunding campaign that I organised this summer, and by the people and organisations who chipped in. In this post I look back at the campaign, show what you will find in QGIS 4.4, and, most importantly, say thank you.
Strahler orders
Why a crowdfunding for hydrology in QGIS?
For years, hydrological analysis in QGIS has depended on external processing providers such as SAGA, GRASS, WhiteboxTools and PCRaster. These are excellent tools, but every QGIS trainer and teacher knows the downside: installation issues, differences between operating systems and versions, and workflows that break when a dependency changes. I see it every time I teach a course.
The Fill Sinks (Wang & Liu) algorithm, ported to QGIS core in 3.44, showed what native tools can bring: stable, fast, cross-platform, and fully integrated in the Processing Toolbox, the Model Designer and PyQGIS. So on 31 July 2026 I launched a crowdfunding to bring the next set of essential hydrology tools into QGIS core, in time for QGIS 4.4.
Together with Nyall Dawson of North Road we defined the toolset, based on proven SAGA implementations, rewritten and optimised for QGIS. QWAST-GIS put in a seed contribution of €2,000. The initial goal was €6,000, with an extended goal of €7,000 for native raster renderers developed by Stefanos Natsis from Lutra Consulting.
On 19 August 2026, well before the campaign closed, we could already announce that both goals were achieved. In total, 35 donors contributed €5,340, which together with the seed money brought the campaign to €7,340.
What's new in QGIS 4.4
The crowdfunded tools are developed by North Road and Lutra Consulting and land in QGIS core with the 4.4 release. You'll find the algorithms in the Processing Toolbox:
- Channel network and drainage tools, split into standalone algorithms:
- Flow direction from a DEM
- Strahler order from a DEM, or from a DEM plus flow direction
- Channels, drainage basins and junctions from a DEM
- Channels from a DEM, flow direction and Strahler order
- Upslope area tools for catchment delineation:
- Upslope area from a point (a single outlet coordinate)
- Upslope area from a layer (the combined catchments of multiple outlet points)
- Thin plate spline interpolation, for example for interpolating groundwater levels from observation wells
- Native raster renderers (the extended goal): a flow direction renderer, and arrow and wind barb renderers for raster U/V data such as currents and wind, matching the existing mesh layer styling
This means groundwater modellers, catchment managers, flood risk assessors, geomorphologists and teachers can now build complete hydrological workflows, including in the Model Designer and PyQGIS, without installing anything extra. The third-party providers remain available for more advanced analyses.
Flowdirection raster rendered as arrows
See the tools in action
In the video below I demonstrate the new tools with a complete catchment analysis, from DEM to stream network and drainage basins.
Want to try it yourself? Follow the step-by-step tutorial here.
Thank you!
A big thank you to everyone who contributed. Whether you gave €5 or €1,000, every donation helped bring these tools into QGIS for everyone, for free.
Organisations
These organisations supported the campaign:
Individuals
Thank you to these individual supporters:
- Barend Köbben
- Dirk Voets
- Gabriel Diosan
- Jonas Wischnewski
- Kurt Menke
- Alexander Thomas, Maribyrnong River and Waterways Association
- Nino Krvavica, University of Rijeka, Faculty of Civil Engineering, Croatia
And a warm thank you to the many donors who preferred to stay anonymous. Your support counts just as much.
Finally, thanks to Nyall Dawson and the team at North Road, and to Lutra Consulting, for turning the plan into working code.
What's next
This campaign shows what a community can achieve together: in less than three weeks, users, companies, user groups and universities funded a lasting improvement to QGIS. Hydrology in QGIS is not finished yet, and I'm already thinking about the next set of tools.
Download QGIS 4.4 from qgis.org, try the new tools, and let me know what you think. Do you have ideas for what should come next? Leave a comment or get in touch.
Rur catchment and streams derived with the new native QGIS tools