This paper presents laboratory measurements of turbulent flow fields and void fraction in deep‐water plunging breaking waves using imaging and optical fiber techniques. Bubble‐size distributions are also determined based on combined measurements of velocity and bubble residence time. The most excited mode of the local intermittency measure of the turbulent flow and its corresponding length scale are obtained using a wavelet‐based method and found to correlate with the swirling strength and vorticity. Concentrated vortical structures with high intermittency are observed near the lower boundaries of the aerated rollers where the velocity shear is high; the length scale of the deduced eddies ranges from 0.05 to 0.15 times the wave height. The number of bubbles with a chord length less than 2 mm demonstrates good correlation with the swirling strength. The power‐law scaling and the Hinze scale of the bubbles determined from the bubble chord length distribution compare favorably with existing measurements. The turbulent dissipation rate, accounting for void fraction, is estimated using mixture theory. When void fraction is not considered, the turbulent dissipation rate is underestimated by more than 70% in the initial impinging and the first splash‐up roller. A significant discrepancy of approximately 67% between the total energy dissipation rate and the turbulence dissipation rate is found. Of this uncounted dissipation, 23% is caused by bubble‐induced dissipation.

Laboratory measurements of velocity fields and void fraction under spilling breaking waves are presented. Modified particle image velocimetry was used to quantify the flow kinematics and turbulence while fibre optic reflectometry was used to quantify the breaking-induced air entrainment inside the aerated region of the spilling breakers. The measurements confirmed that the ratio of the local energy flux and the local energy density sharply increases and exceeds the threshold value of 0.85 near the onset of breaking. Based on the measured velocity fields, the maximum horizontal velocity reached at approximately one-quarter of a wave period after the onset of breaking. The results also confirmed that the wavelet-educed turbulence length scale estimates are comparable to the previously reported values with different wave parameters, suggesting that the dependence of the size of energy-containing eddies on the physical scales of the breaking waves is insignificant. The measured void fraction showed a similarity profile although the measurement locations span one wavelength. The mean kinetic energy, turbulent kinetic energy, potential energy and total energy were quantified with and without the void fraction being accounted for. Results show near 60 % and 40 % overestimates of the kinetic energy and the potential energy if the void fraction is not considered. After correcting the density variation due to air entrainment, the total energy dissipated following an exponential decay, with 43 % and 65 % energy being dissipated at one and two wavelengths downstream from the breaking point, respectively. The equipartition assumption was found to be applicable before and during the entire breaking process in the present spilling breakers.