iPhone Weather Apps: MyWeather Mobile vs. Fizz Weather
Vs.
I’m kind of a weather junkie in that I want the latest weather info available at my fingertips all the time. On my iMac at home I have the National Weather Service Grand Forks station bookmarked in Safari but accessing NOAA using the internet over EDGE on my iPhone isn’t as satisfying as perhaps it could be. The site loads slow and you have to reverse pinch/enlarge so that you can read it. It’s hard taping the exact spot to go to the radar page as well. I do access it from my phone once in a while, especially if there is bad weather in the area and I want the most complete information possible but for everyday use I figured an iTunes App would suffice. Ideally, the weather app for me would need at least the following features:
• Animated Weather Radar
• Severe weather announcements
• Detailed daily forecasts
My first foray into weather apps was the free WeatherBug. It’s a reasonably featured basic weather app and I really like the directional wind arrows but WeatherBug wasn’t robust enough for my needs and I could never get animated radar. WeatherBug’s most compelling feature is the price: free. If you don’t need or want animated radar WeatherBug might be for you. I moved on.
My next stop ended up being
MyWeather Mobile by
MyWeather.com. It’s a $15 app but had garnered good reviews on iTunes. For the most part MyWeather Mobile is a feature rich and polished app. You can set up multiple locations to display weather and for each location you get a basic 7 day forecast, a 12 hour Trend data and an animated radar. To change the info to a different location just tap its name in the list. Although convenient, this method of displaying your different locations also has a downside: the list takes up valuable real estate that could be used for displaying more detailed forecast info.
Speaking of forecasts, this is probably MyWeather Mobile’s weakest feature. All you get is an icon representing the weather, a couple words (Sunny, Mostly Sunny, etc.) and the high and low temperatures
forecasted for the day. I really want more info than that. Tap on the Trend button and you’ll be presented with three attractive looking graphs that represent the forecasted temperature and sky conditions, wind speed and direction, and precipitation for the next 12 hours. So, I suppose you could say that this is where the detailed forecast information is contained. It’s not my style, however. They are attractive and informative and would be a great compliment to any forecast but I need text. I like to read a weather report and then have the option to view graphs and other additional weather indicators. Also, there is no humidity, barometer reading, heat index, windchill indicators, etc. MyWeather just provides the very basics.
The animated radar is where MyWeather Mobile shines. From the main screen tap the Radar button and a small radar image replaces the Forecast or Trend data. Your current location will be indicated with an orange dot. Other locations you’ve entered are indicated with yellow dots. In this view the radar is somewhat useful but the default zoom level leaves me wanting. No problem, I just double tap where I want to zoom. Each set of double taps brings me in closer until I can finally make out major landmarks and roads. Even better is the landscape mode as you get at least double the radar coverage. Did I mention the radar was animated? Sweet! The animation, after it loads, is smooth and really does look nice.
My only gripe with the radar is that it uses Microsoft Earth for the base on which it overlays the radar image. This in and of itself would be bad except Microsoft Earth’s map data is way out of date and in some cases just plain goofy. I live out in the sticks in between Park Rapids and Menahga Minnesota. There are no other towns in the 12 mile stretch between the two but Microsoft Earth insists that just about smack dab in the middle, where my house is located, there’s a place called Horton. In reality there is no such place. I’ve even done research to see if at one time there was such a place but I can find nothing. I’ve found more than a few instances of complete inaccuracies similar to this.
As you zoom in, as I previously stated, Microsoft Earth will start filling in map data for landmarks and features: highways, towns, rivers, lakes etc. My gripe here is that the first landmarks it throws up are not what you’d normally expect. For instance, instead of the city of Park Rapids popping up as I zoom in Microsoft Earth first throws up nearby Indian Reservations. Four or five sets of double taps later finally brings up highways around the area but still no major landmarks like the nearby towns. The next double tap brings up obscure but nearby lakes. Finally, after at least seven or eight sets of double taps Park Rapids makes its appearance (as does the infamous Horton). This is way too much double tapping just to get recognizable landmarks to show up on the map. You can also reverse pinch to zoom as you do with Google maps but you still get the same result: weird, obscure and just downright incorrect map landmark data.
As I said, MyWeather Mobile is a nice, polished app but wanting more in the forecast department I bought and downloaded
Fizz Weather by
Fizz Software. Released in late August for $6, it too was getting good reviews on the iTunes Store. Fizz Weather is also a very polished and attractive iPhone app, in fact the forecast screen is more attractive and appealing to me than MyWeather Mobile. It also packs in a ton more information which was the primary reason I bought it.
Fizz Weather is also capable of displaying weather info for multiple locations. Once you set multiple locations just swipe to the right or left and you’re taken to the new locations forecast page. This is a much nicer way of displaying multiple locations weather info as it makes use of the whole iPhone screen. The Forecast page includes all the info you’d expect to find: Current wind speed and direction, precipitation chance percentage, humidity and comfort level temperature and UV level. The main forecast page also includes a brief weather description (Thunderstorms, Warm, etc.) the high and low temperatures and a large, attractive graphical weather representation icon. In the screen shot the icon shows an exploding Sun (indicating a moderate UV level) partly covered by clouds with a lightning bolt shooting out of it. Cool! Best yet, in the upper right hand corner, if there are weather alerts Fizz Weather displays a small red tappable triangle. When you tap on it you’re presented with, you guessed it, weather alerts for your chosen location. Also on the forecast page you have buttons for the 2 day and 5 day forecast, maps (radar, satellite and forecast), a Now button and Airports. The first three buttons are pretty self explanatory. The Now button displays the current conditions: wind speed and direction, comfort level temperature, visibility, barometer and humidity. Now we’re talking! The Airports button brings up a 24 hour and 48 hour weather related flight status window. Basically, this just tells you if there are any weather related delays at any of the nearby airports.
Fizz Weather also comes with animated radar but it’s not nearly as nice as MyWeather Mobile’s. It’s okay at the default regional zoom level which is set so you can see about a quarter of the continental US (centered on your chosen location). Where Fizz Weather’s radar fails badly is when you zoom. The radar doesn’t try to re-render at higher zoom levels it just enlarges the image making it pixelate. Also, you don’t get any more landmark detail as you zoom. If the radar was better there would be no comparison with MyWeather Mobile and Fizz Weather would win hands down. Unfortunately the poor attempt at an animated radar means that I’d have to have at least one other app to provide this feature.
For actual weather data I much prefer Fizz Weather. It has all the info I need and want and the interface is polished and well thought out. For radar, however, MyWeather Mobile wins hands down. It doesn’t provide near the detailed forecast or current weather info as Fizz Weather does nor does it provide you with any weather alerts. Ultimately your choice will come down to what features are more important to you. If you value high quality animated radar, go with MyWeather Mobile. If detailed forecast information and weather alerts are more important Fizz Weather is the way to go. As I said before both apps are attractive and sport well polished, intuitive user interfaces. You really can’t go wrong with either. For me, I guess I’ll just have to keep them both.
Joe Henry
