The ridge is building.
Turning weather data into decisions: what to do, where, and when to go.
What should I do this weekend?
Those are the questions that matter, and no weather app answers them easily. They show you numbers, mostly for cities: a temperature, a probability of rain, a wind speed. Then they leave you to decide whether 18 mph gusts ruin a paddle (they do), whether the smoke is too thick for a run, and whether Saturday morning beats Sunday afternoon.
WeatherRidge answers the question you actually asked. Tell it what you like to do and how you like to do it. It reads the latest forecast models, scores every place and every hour against your preferences, and shows you where and when conditions are best. Packing the car is still on you.
Every activity cares about different weather.
Planning a day outside used to mean opening five tabs. One spot forecast, a second model to check it against, the air quality map, the radar, and maybe a snow report. Then the hard part: filtering all of it, in your head, against the activity you had in mind, while someone asks whether you're going or not.
And every activity cares about something different.
Most apps solve this for one sport at a time and charge a premium for each. But people aren't single-activity. The same person skis in January, paddles in July and walks the dog every day. The dog has opinions about weather too. WeatherRidge is one tool for all of us.
40 activities, each with its own thresholds.
WeatherRidge ships with 40 activities across nine families. Each starts with sensible defaults for every weather factor: temperature, wind, gusts, rain probability, humidity, cloud cover, visibility, UV and air quality. Each factor has an ideal range and a tolerable one. The defaults are a good start. Your joints may disagree, so change them.
It doesn't matter to you. Clouds? Whatever.
Conditions fade gently from ideal to tolerable.
A deal-breaker. Breach it and that place drops to the bottom, however good everything else is. A 40 mph gust doesn't get partial credit.
Tune every activity at once in the Activity Studio, a dashboard of every threshold, or drag the bands directly on its chart view.
The Condition Index
Built from your own preferences, not someone else's idea of a nice day. Every map colour, route mark and day card reads from the same five bands.
A deal-breaker is breached, or the weather is severe. Stay home. The couch might be the best option.
Multiple conditions outside your comfort range. Think twice, and possibly change the time or activity.
Several conditions stray from your targets. Doable, if you're keen. Possible type 2 fun.
Comfortable, with one or two factors near the edge. Bring a layer.
Most or all of what matters lands inside your ideal window. Go! Why are you still reading?
Choose the forecast model, or let Auto choose.
A forecast is only as good as the model behind it, and different models are good at different things. Other weather apps give you one model, sometimes proprietary and unnamed. WeatherRidge shows you which one you're looking at and lets you choose. A second opinion, or a third.
Flip between them in a keystroke and watch the map change. When the models agree, you can trust the forecast. When they don't, you know to keep an eye on it, and to pack the rain shell. Remember, forecasts are just computer models of what might happen. If in doubt, go on out!
Picks the best model for where and when you're looking: HRRR's 3 km detail for the next two days in the US, NOAA's NBM blend after that, HRDPS in Canada, AROME and ICON in Europe, and ECMWF everywhere else.
From ten: HRRR, NBM, RRFS, HRDPS, AROME, ICON-D2, ICON-EU, ECMWF, GFS and GEM. Hover any of them for its resolution, update cycle, horizon and coverage.
Combines the three global models, ECMWF, GFS and GEM, weighting each by how far ahead you're looking. Shows you the agreement, or lack thereof, between the major long-range models.
Always the latest run. Each model is refreshed on its agency's own official schedule. WeatherRidge knows when each next run lands, so the moment NOAA, Environment Canada, Météo-France, DWD or ECMWF publish a new forecast, yours is marked out of date, and with Autoload on it refreshes the next time you come back to the tab. HRRR runs every hour and does not take weekends off. You're never planning on yesterday's numbers, and the model chip always shows how fresh the run you're looking at is.
| Model | Agency | Detail | New run | Looks ahead | Covers |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| HRRR | NOAA | 3 km | Every hour | 48 h | Continental US |
| NBM | NOAA / NWS | 2.5 km | Every hour | 11 days | Continental US |
| RRFS | NOAA | 3 km | Every 6 hours | 3.5 days | Continental US |
| HRDPS | Environment Canada | 2.5 km | Every 6 hours | 3 days | Canada and US |
| AROME | Météo-France | 1.3 km | Every 3 hours | 2 days | France and Western Europe |
| ICON-D2 | DWD | 2.2 km | Every 3 hours | 2 days | Central Europe |
| ICON-EU | DWD | 7 km | Every 6 hours | 5 days | Europe |
| ECMWF | ECMWF | 25 km | Twice a day | 15 days | Global |
| GFS | NOAA | 13 to 25 km | Every 6 hours | 16 days | Global |
| GEM | Environment Canada | 15 km | Twice a day | 10 days | Global |
View a full REGION, a specific ROUTE, or saved favorite locations in SPOT mode.
Region
In Region mode, pan the map over everywhere you'd be willing to drive. (Be honest.) WeatherRidge scores a grid of points across the whole view and paints the result as a continuous wash: green where conditions suit your activity, red where they don't. Score contours trace the edges like elevation lines on a topo map.
The Best Locations rail lists the top spots by name. Step through the hours and days and watch the good weather move.
Route
In Route mode, drop in the GPX from the route you planned in Gaia, CalTopo, Garmin Connect, RideWithGPS, Strava or anywhere else, and keep it in one of three libraries.
The routes you do all the time: the daily run, the bike commute, the morning paddle, the evening dog walk. Check this week's best window for each in seconds.
The big trips you're waiting to do someday, when the timing and the weather finally line up. Keep an eye on them and pounce when they turn green. Someday turns out to be this weekend.
Iconic routes from around the world that are in season right now, picked by WeatherRidge and refreshed every month. Load one with just a click, for inspiration or for next weekend. YOLO.
Whichever you load, WeatherRidge follows you along it at your set pace, reading the forecast for each stretch at the hour you'll actually be there, adjusted for elevation along the way.
Spot
Pick a place: home, work, the trailhead, your VRBO rental, the local climbing crag. SPOT mode lays out every one of your activities against every day of the coming week or two, so you can see at a glance that Tuesday is a golf day, Thursday a ride and Saturday a hike. Work goes on whichever day is left. Open any day for the hour-by-hour detail: temperature, apparent temperature, wind and gusts, rain and snow, freezing level.
A forecast is not the whole picture.
WeatherRidge stacks the other layers that decide a day outside right onto the same map, each one a toggle away. Turn on as many as you like.
In addition to your own Condition Index, WeatherRidge warns you about standard heat index and frostbite dangers.
Fast, and built for quick research and decisions.
Shortcut keys and hovertips on nearly every control make it quick to learn and fun to use. It works on your phone as well, for decisions at the trailhead.
WeatherRidge