rain percentages what do they mean?

[orangeshoebox]

30%
can I go out without umbrella?
will it rain?
or just not much?

I don't get it

aibs (am I being stupid)?

Generally means there's a 30% chance it will rain. You'd need to look at the specific forecast to see how heavy that rain is likely to be. I guess it depends how long you're going to be outside for and how much you're bothered by being rained on!

It is a 30% chance of rain. There's a really good explanation on a recent More or Less podcast.

thank
will listen to the podcast.

the 30% this morning so far were rather torrential...

Haha, I’ve always had an issue with this too. Either it rains or it doesn’t. So I’d take an umbrella :)

My weather app is so inaccurate. I find it really hard to believe that we can cure all sorts of diseases, send items millions of miles into space, build particle accelerators ....
and yet we can't predict what the weather will be like in an hour's time!

On more than one occasion my phone has said 0% chance of rain while it is currently raining!

listened now, but it's still confusing.
the weather guys need to do work to present it better.

www.bbc.co.uk/sounds/play/b0b3fz4c

Right. It doesn't tell you how much rain there will be if it does rain. Could be a light shower or pouring. It just tells you how likely it is that it will rain at all.

What you have to remember is that in a lot of cases, the weather is often unpredictable. There are times when it definitely will or won't rain but in the UK, most of the time it depends on where the winds and clouds go, and they can predict, but it's far from certain.

On more than one occasion my phone has said 0% chance of rain while it is currently raining!

Few weeks ago my new phone said there was 100% chance of rain in 78 minutes. Fifteen minutes later it said there was 100% chance of rain in 73 minutes. Eight minutes later it said there was 100% chance of rain in 8 minutes.

I think we had three spots.

I think we had three spots.

So it was right?

I use The Weather Channel app and check the hourly forecast for my area. The rain radar and rain alerts are also really useful

I find it bizarrely accurate. If it says 30% chance of rain it usually refers to the rain intensity. You have to go into 'hourly' and look at what hour/s it's likely to take place. When it says

Dark sky people. So far the most accurate ever.
It will say what chance, what type and when it’s coming

I find that my three pine cones on the garden table are the most accurate predictors of rain. Weather app reasonable. Alexa not so good.

"30% chance of rain today" means that on 100 days like today it will rain on 30 of them and not rain on 70 of them.

100% chance of rain but the raindrops will only be 30% of their normal size. I think.

Haha, I’ve always had an issue with this too. Either it rains or it doesn’t. So I’d take an umbrella

Depends on your risk appetite. I'm not going to cart an umbrella round for a 5% chance of rain. I'll take my chances and get soaked on average once every 20 times.