This special issue of Oceania interrogates the material and cultural factors underpinning water socio‐economies in Australia; a critical project given the wet and dry crises now unfolding in theAnthropocene. Three themes inform the collection–materialities, imaginaries and temporalities–each of which animates a diverse array of ethnographic inquiry into transformative water futures. Theradical potential of kinship is also a cross‐cutting theme, with the articles collectively revealing howkin relatedness works to disrupt the categorical framing of‘modern water’as an extractive resource.