Vertical land motions are a key element in understanding how sea levels have changed over the past century and how future sea levels may impact coastal areas. Ideally, to be useful in long‐term sea level studies, vertical land motion should be determined with standard errors that are 1 order of magnitude lower than the contemporary climate signals of 1 to 3 mm/yr observed on average in sea level records, either using tide gauges or satellites. This metrological requirement constitutes a challenge in geodesy. Here we review the most successful instrumental methods that have been used to determine vertical displacements at the Earth's surface, so that the objectives of understanding and anticipating sea levels can be addressed adequately in terms of accuracy. In this respect, the required level of uncertainty is examined in two case studies (global and local). A special focus is given to the use of the Global Positioning System (GPS) and to the combination of satellite radar altimetry with tide gauge data. We update previous data analyses and assess the quality of global satellite altimetry products available to the users for coastal applications. Despite recent advances, a near‐plateau level of accuracy has been reached. The major limitation is the realization of the terrestrial reference frame, whose physical parameters, the origin and the scale factor, are beyond the scope of a unique technique such as the GPS. Additional practical but nonetheless important issues are associated with the installation of GPS antennas, such as ensuring that there is no unknown differential vertical motion with the tide gauge.

We review the characteristics of sea level variability at the coast focussing on how it differs from the variability in the nearby deep ocean. Sea level variability occurs on all timescales, with processes at higher frequencies tending to have a larger magnitude at the coast due to resonance and other dynamics. In the case of some processes, such as the tides, the presence of the coast and the shallow waters of the shelves results in the processes being considerably more complex than offshore. However, ‘coastal variability’ should not always be considered as ‘short spatial scale variability’ but can be the result of signals transmitted along the coast from 1000s km away. Fortunately, thanks to tide gauges being necessarily located at the coast, many aspects of coastal sea level variability can be claimed to be better understood than those in the deep ocean. Nevertheless, certain aspects of coastal variability remain under-researched, including how changes in some processes (e.g., wave setup, river runoff) may have contributed to the historical mean sea level records obtained from tide gauges which are now used routinely in large-scale climate research.

The rate at which global mean sea level (GMSL) rose during the 20th century is uncertain, with little consensus between various reconstructions that indicate rates of rise ranging from 1.3 to 2 mm⋅y⁻¹. Here we present a 20th-century GMSL reconstruction computed using an area-weighting technique for averaging tide gauge records that both incorporates up-to-date observations of vertical land motion (VLM) and corrections for local geoid changes resulting from ice melting and terrestrial freshwater storage and allows for the identification of possible differences compared with earlier attempts. Our reconstructed GMSL trend of 1.1 ± 0.3 mm⋅y⁻¹ (1σ) before 1990 falls below previous estimates, whereas our estimate of 3.1 ± 1.4 mm⋅y⁻¹ from 1993 to 2012 is consistent with independent estimates from satellite altimetry, leading to overall acceleration larger than previously suggested. This feature is geographically dominated by the Indian Ocean–Southern Pacific region, marking a transition from lower-than-average rates before 1990 toward unprecedented high rates in recent decades. We demonstrate that VLM corrections, area weighting, and our use of a common reference datum for tide gauges may explain the lower rates compared with earlier GMSL estimates in approximately equal proportion. The trends and multidecadal variability of our GMSL curve also compare well to the sum of individual contributions obtained from historical outputs of the Coupled Model Intercomparison Project Phase 5. This, in turn, increases our confidence in process-based projections presented in the Fifth Assessment Report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change.