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The majority of the eddy kinetic energy (EKE) in the ocean is found on scales of 50 km to 500 km, encompassed by mesoscale eddies and the meanders and rings of the boundary currents. Mesoscale eddies play a critical role in the dynamics of the ocean circulation with instabilities of the strong mean currents generating eddies in the upper ocean. Interactions between eddies transfer energy from the upper ocean to the deep ocean where eddies interact with bottom topography to generate abyssal mean flows and eddies transfer momentum back to the mean currents. The kinetic energy in a global Hybrid Coordinate Ocean Circulation Model (HYCOM) is compared with long‐term observations from surface drifters, geostrophic currents from satellite altimetry, subsurface floats and deep current meter moorings. HYCOM, configured at 1/12.5° (∼9 km, typical of the present generation of high resolution models), is …