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Groundwater commonly is portrayed in diagrams of the hydrological cycle as a single pool of water with simple transfers of water to and from the land surface, oceans, and atmosphere. In reality, groundwater is an integral part of a complex hydrological cycle that involves the continuous movement of water on Earth. We begin with a global perspective on the importance of groundwater in the hydrological cycle and then address the importance of understanding the dynamics of groundwater‐flow systems. We next turn our attention to groundwater budgets and the effects of humans and climate on these budgets. The final section is devoted to a discussion of interactions between groundwater and surface water, and we highlight the importance of these interactions in the hydrological cycle.

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