Nuh (peace be upon him) was sent to his people to warn them and to call them to worship Allah alone and abandon their idols (71:1-3, 71:23). He called them night and day, openly and in secret, but the more he called, the more they fled, putting their fingers in their ears and persisting in arrogance (71:5-7).
He remained among them for a very long time preaching the message; the Qur'an states he stayed a thousand years less fifty (29:14). Only a few believed with him, and the chiefs mocked him and dismissed his followers as lowly (11:27). When it became clear that no more would believe, Allah told him not to grieve over them (11:36).
Allah commanded Nuh to build the ark under His watch and revelation, and the disbelievers ridiculed him as he worked (11:37-38). When the command came, the oven gushed forth water, and Nuh was told to carry aboard a pair of every kind, his family except those against whom the word had gone forth, and the believers (11:40).
The waters rose in mountainous waves. Nuh called out to his son to embark and not to be with the disbelievers, but the son refused, thinking a mountain would shelter him, and he was among the drowned (11:42-43). The earth was commanded to swallow its water and the sky to cease, the ark came to rest on Mount Judi, and the wrongdoers were destroyed (11:44).
Nuh is honoured among the greatest messengers, and Allah left his good remembrance among later generations (37:78-79).