Which UK weather forecast is most accurate? We checked 2.4 million

In short: no UK weather forecast is the most accurate at everything. Across 2.4 million forecasts marked from June to October 2026, DWD and the Met Office were best for rain, YR for temperature and Apple for wind.

For this month's standings, see the live league table, updated every hour against real rain gauges.

How did we test the forecasts?

We saved what five forecasters predicted for every hour of the next ten days, every few hours since June 2026, then marked each hour against the official Met Office weather stations nearby. Each hour was checked for temperature, wind, whether it rained, and what the sky did. An hour counts as rainy if 0.2mm or more fell.

The five come from five different organisations, each running its own weather model:

• Met Office, the UK's national weather service
• Apple, the forecast behind the iPhone's Weather app
• YR, from the Norwegian Meteorological Institute
• DWD, the German national weather service's ICON model
• Tomorrow.io, an American company with its own model

We test the forecast data each provider sends out, not the design of anyone's app. The BBC is not included, because its forecasts come from a supplier whose data we do not take.

Which is the most accurate weather forecast for rain?

DWD, the German weather service, gave the most reliable chance of rain, with the Met Office level with it to three decimal places. We rank rain by the Brier score, which checks how close each forecaster's percentage was to what happened, hour by hour, and so counts false alarms and missed showers together. Lower is better.

The single score hides the more useful finding, which is that each forecaster leans one way.

The forecasts that catch the most rain

YR and the Met Office saw 47% of the rainy hours coming, more than anyone else. They pay for it in false alarms: when YR said rain it rained 38% of the time, and the Met Office 43%.

The forecasts that rarely cry wolf

Apple and Tomorrow.io were right most often when they did call rain, at 54% and 56%. They saw only about a quarter of the rainy hours coming, which is why an iPhone so often promises a dry afternoon that turns wet.

Which is the most accurate forecast for temperature?

YR, from the Norwegian Meteorological Institute, was closest on temperature, 0.83°C out on average. The Met Office came last of the five at 1.20°C, still close but beaten on British weather by four rivals.

Which is the most accurate forecast for wind?

Apple and Tomorrow.io were closest on wind, both 2.8 kph out on average, with the Met Office a fraction behind. YR, the best on temperature, was the worst on wind by some distance.

Is the Met Office accurate?

Yes on rain, where the Met Office sits joint top of the five, and less so on temperature, where it came last. It leans towards calling rain, so it rarely leaves you caught out, but 57% of its rain calls stayed dry. On wind it was within a whisker of the best.

Met Office vs Apple Weather: which is more accurate?

The Met Office is better at warning you about rain, and Apple is better on temperature. The Met Office saw 47% of rainy hours coming against Apple's 26%, while Apple was 0.25°C closer on temperature and more often right when it did call rain. On wind they were level. If you mind getting wet, the Met Office suits you; if you mind cancelling for nothing, Apple does.

Which is the most accurate weather app in the UK?

None of the five forecasters was the most accurate at everything, so the answer depends on what you check first. YR leads on temperature and trails on wind. Apple leads on wind and misses three quarters of the rain. The Met Office is strong on rain and last on temperature.

That is why Weather for Dads reads all five rather than picking one. It works out which has been right lately for rain, temperature, wind and sky, and leans on that one. Marked the same way, the blend comes out ahead on all four, and when it says dry, it stays dry about 19 hours in 20.

What is the best weather app in the UK?

The best weather app in the UK is the one built on the most accurate forecast for what you care about, and for most people that means rain. On our marking, the forecasts behind the Met Office and DWD gave the most reliable chance of rain, Apple's iPhone forecast was strongest on wind, and YR on temperature. An app that blends them, weighting each by how it has done lately, avoids being stuck with one forecaster's weak spot, which is the idea behind Weather for Dads. Whatever you use, check whether it tells you how accurate it has been: most apps never do.

What is the best free weather app in the UK?

Every forecast in this test is available free in an app. The Met Office app and YR's app are free, Apple Weather comes on every iPhone, and Weather for Dads is free with no account and no ads. So the choice isn't about price: pick by what you care about most. For rain, the Met Office leans towards warning you; for temperature, YR was closest; for wind, Apple. Or use one that blends them and shows you how it has been doing.

Why is the weather forecast always wrong?

The weather forecast feels always wrong because rain calls are wrong a lot more often than dry ones. A shower can miss you by a street, so even the best rain call here came true 56% of the time, while dry calls held at about 19 hours in 20. Our advice: trust a dry forecast, and treat a rainy one as a reason to take a coat. We explain what the percentages mean in what does 40% chance of rain actually mean.

Where can I check the figures?

Every figure here is live on the Weather for Dads accuracy page, updated as each hour is marked, including where the blend comes off worse. You can break it down by how far ahead the forecast was looking, and every forecaster is sharper for the next few hours than for next weekend.

There are two limits to these figures. The Met Office stations record rain as a weather code, and our own test against the Environment Agency's rain gauges, which measure the water itself, suggests the stations call more hours wet than the gauges find. The only other public UK test we know of, a University of Reading study reported by Which?, compared just the BBC and Met Office apps, at one place. We will publish what the gauge test changes once there has been enough rain to be sure.