What is the term for a seismic wave that travels along Earth's surface?

The term for a seismic wave that travels along Earth's surface is a surface wave.

Seismic waves are commonly divided into body waves, which travel through Earth's interior, and surface waves, which propagate along the ground near the surface. The two principal seismic surface-wave types are Rayleigh waves and Love waves. Rayleigh waves combine vertical and horizontal motion, producing a rolling movement, while Love waves involve horizontal shear motion.

Surface waves are generated when earthquake P waves and S waves interact with Earth's surface. They generally travel more slowly than body waves, so they arrive later at a seismograph, but their energy diminishes less rapidly with distance. That makes them especially important in earthquake damage, particularly during shallow earthquakes.

The distractors describe different categories. P-waves and S-waves are body-wave types, while “body wave” is the broader category for waves traveling through Earth's interior. A surface wave is defined by its path along an interface, not by whether its source is an earthquake.