Headland sediment bypassing relates short-term physical forcing and long-term morphological response. The contributions from King et al., 2021 are a substantial step in understanding the complexities by using all three research approaches of field observations, process-based numerical modeling, and generalization with the development of an improved parametrization of headland sediment bypassing. This latest study adds to the growing body of knowledge around littoral cell boundaries, or as proposed in this commentary, littoral cell zones that recognize the importance of temporal variability and how this may influence shoreline position models. Anticipated climate change-induced evolution of the shoreline can be better understood with these additions.