Colorado Water Rights

Last verified

About this site

Colorado publishes every decreed water right and well permit in the state, free, to anyone. The problem is that the tools are built for water engineers and nobody wrote the manual.

This site is that manual — plus a plain-English explanation of the law behind it, with the statute cited every time a claim depends on one, and the date it was last checked on every page.

Why it exists

Colorado water law is genuinely hard, and most of what is written about it online falls into two categories: law firm articles that stop just before the useful part, and general explainers that repeat each other's mistakes. Meanwhile the state's own records — 173,056 decreed rights, roughly 646,000 well permits, every active river call — sit in public tools that almost nobody outside the industry knows how to use.

The gap that bothered us most is the one where a person buys land believing it has water, and finds out afterwards that it does not. That is a checkable fact, checkable for free, in about an afternoon — and here is how.

What we try to do differently

Who runs it

Colorado Water Rights is an independent reference site. It is not affiliated with, endorsed by, or published on behalf of the Colorado Division of Water Resources, the Colorado Judicial Branch, the Office of Legislative Legal Services, or any other government body. It is not a law firm, and nothing on it is legal advice.

It is written and maintained by a small independent team in Colorado, working from the primary sources directly. We are not water attorneys or water engineers; when a question needs one, we say so and explain how to choose.

How it is paid for

Right now, it is not. There are no advertisements, no sponsored content, no affiliate links, and no paid placements anywhere on this site. If that ever changes — a referral relationship, a paid listing, a product — it will be disclosed on the page where it appears, plainly, and we will say who is paying. Our commitment is that a recommendation here will never be one we were paid to make without telling you.

Corrections

If something here is wrong, we want to know, and we would rather hear it bluntly. Email corrections@cowaterrights.com with the page and what is wrong — a statute citation or a record link is ideal. Corrections are made on the page, and the last-verified date is updated when they are.

Privacy

The only personal data this site collects is an email address, and only if you type one into the guide form yourself. We set no cookies of our own, run no analytics and no advertising trackers, and we never sell, rent, trade or share your address. Every email has a working unsubscribe link, and you can have your address deleted by emailing us.

That is the summary. The Privacy Policy is the full statement — what we collect, who processes it, how long it is kept, and how to exercise your rights — and it governs if the two ever differ. The Terms of Use cover everything else.

What is coming

The obvious next step is per-division and per-district data pages built from the state's records — the largest rights in each basin, the oldest, current call status. That is a lot of work to do properly, and it will happen only if this site turns out to be useful to people. If there is something you looked for here and did not find, that is the most useful thing you can tell us.

Start with the basics if you are new to Colorado water, or looking up a water right if you already know what you are trying to find.

The Colorado water rights owner's guide

A plain-English walkthrough of finding, reading, and protecting a Colorado water right — plus a short email when the rules change. No spam; unsubscribe anytime.