'Perfect Weather' Offers Detailed Weather Forecasts at a Glance

MacRumors · Sep 17, 2013

Perfect Weather is a new weather app from Contrast (formerly App Cubby), the developers behind shortcut app Launch Center Pro. While there are hundreds of weather apps available in the App Store, Perfect Weather offers detailed information packaged in a no-frills single-screen design.

The app offers a seven-day forecast that includes an interactive line graph of expected temperatures for the next 24-hour period. Sliding a finger on the graph provides the estimated temperature at exact moments, and swiping to the left reveals specific information about humidity, pressure, visibility, wind speed, sunrise, sunset, and more.

Perfect Weather is organized in a manner similar to Apple's Passbook. There is a main forecast window, but pulling down allows access to additional locations and tapping will minimize the window to reveal an animated radar map underneath. The radar map displays either 20 minutes of rain activity or three hours of cloud activity.

All the weather info you need at a glance:

- 7 day forecast
- Weather maps with radar and clouds
- Detailed current conditions
- Temperature chart with hourly forecast pop-up

Clear interface that's easy to use:

- See temperatures in all locations at once
- Switch quickly between locations
- View and share severe weather alerts

Because Perfect Weather uses data from NOAA for its radar map and forecasts, it is only available to users within the United States. The app can be downloaded from the App Store for $2.99. [Direct Link]

Article Link: 'Perfect Weather' Offers Detailed Weather Forecasts at a Glance

leon44 · Sep 17, 2013

and if you don't live in America, MeteoEarth gives you this much data and it's awesome.
http://www.meteoearth.com/mobile/en.html
(if you're interested it's derived from a combination of ECMWF, UK Met Office and NCEP data into one pretty accurate big global MeteoGroup model)

DocStone · Sep 17, 2013

Pay those bills!

Looks like MR is paying the bills again....

johnparjr · Sep 17, 2013

The new weather app in ios7 is great too

69650 · Sep 17, 2013

Not available in the iTunes UK Store. Shame, it looks really good.

GIZBUG · Sep 17, 2013

$2.99 for this, when I can get a "trusted name" The Weather Channel, Yahoo Weather, or Accuweather for free? No Thanks.

naeS1Sean · Sep 17, 2013

Meh...replacing stock apps seems like a tough market. I'll stick with Apple's gorgeous weather app.

keysofanxiety · Sep 17, 2013

DocStone said:
Looks like MR is paying the bills again....

Why the sarcastic comment? This site is free and they're showing an application that some people may find useful -- MR have, on multiple occasions, state that they don't advertise apps for profit.

Other people may find this app useful, and I myself have checked out a lot of apps that MR have previously demonstrated -- as I wouldn't have found them otherwise.

Sometimes I feel 90% of comments these days are just a rush to get the first sarcastic comment, adding absolutely nothing to the discussion.

zencowboy · Sep 17, 2013

The NOAA cast Pro (the one by NOAA) was very accurate during the crazy storms here in Boulder CO. The future-cast was helpful.

nutmac · Sep 17, 2013

I like the developer so I pulled the trigger to show support. $2.99 is totally fine to me if it means the developer will be able to support and improve the app.

My initial impression:

The app resembles my go-to "power weather" iPad app, Seasonality Go. Like it, it has pastel color accents and chart, but greatly stripped down to bare essentials.
The app resembles Apple's Passbook and iOS 7's Reminders app, using cards metaphor. Each card represents a location and you can drag it to rearrange as you like. You cannot customize the color of each card, however.
The app has 6 views: (1) Summary that shows current temperature and condition (e.g., cloudy, clear) of all the cards (locations), (2) click on the card and it will expand to show selected location's summary + daily high and low + precipitation, (3) unroll for 7-day forecast (with daily high/low and condition), (4) unroll more for daily temperature chart, (5) swipe right on the daily temperature chart for feels like temperature, humidity, pressure, visibility, wind, sunrise, sunset, and dew point, and (6) click on the little "lightning" button on the left side of each card to see "alert report" view that shows weather alert.
In the bottom of each view is a satellite map, with a button to animate the last 20 minutes and another button to toggle between precipitation and cloud (there's also + and - slider, but I have no idea what it does).
The app feels quick and right on my iPhone 5 running iOS 7 GM.
The data comes from WDT (NOAA), not my preferred Forecast.io. But it seems accurate enough.

Issues:

"Your Location" view does not show name of the location.
All the data are shown in US-imperial units (e.g., Fahrenheit, mph, inches, miles). No option to change.
The app does not pull data from cities in other countries, even Canada and Mexico are not available.

----------

GIZBUG said:
$2.99 for this, when I can get a "trusted name" The Weather Channel, Yahoo Weather, or Accuweather for free? No Thanks.

The developer, David Barnard, is highly respected in the iOS development community. I rather use highly polished app from talented independent developer vs. commercial app that feels bloated and rushed to the market and/or packed with ads. Also, you should look at this Oatmeal's comic.
This is how I feel about buying apps.

nagromme · Sep 17, 2013

I'll keep it in mind, but Universal and Dark Sky "future radar" are features I look for.

OriginalMacRat · Sep 17, 2013

GIZBUG said:
$2.99 for this, when I can get a "trusted name" The Weather Channel, Yahoo Weather, or Accuweather for free? No Thanks.

Yup. Clearly a paid advertisement.

Other trusted name apps gaining a strong reputation are WeatherBug, WunderGround and Forecast.io.

Technically, Forecast.io is a web app, but it is really nice.

OllyW · Sep 17, 2013

OriginalMacRat said:
Yup. Clearly a paid advertisement.

MacRumors doesn't do paid promotions without disclosing the fact.

https://macrumors.zendesk.com/hc/en-us#Are_news_stories_really_advertising_in_disguise.3F

nutmac · Sep 17, 2013

OriginalMacRat said:
Yup. Clearly a paid advertisement.

Other trusted name apps gaining a strong reputation are WeatherBug, WunderGround and Forecast.io.

Technically, Forecast.io is a web app, but it is really nice.

WeatherBug: the free version is ad supported. Ad-free version costs $2.99

Weather Uunderground: ad supported. To remove ads, you need to pay $1.99 per year subscription.

Forecast.io website is a promotional tool to get developers sign up and pay for access to its API and it has ads from Fusion. And like you said, while it is nice, it's a website, not an app.

If you want free ad-supported apps, you can use one of thousands of apps out there or stick to Apple's built-in Weather app. If you want ad-free, you gotta pay as developers need to feed themselves and often need to pay for access to weather data.

Battlefield Fan · Sep 17, 2013

How much money is MR getting out of this?

OllyW · Sep 17, 2013

Battlefield Fan said:
How much money is MR getting out of this?

Nothing at all.

https://forums.macrumors.com/posts/17918987/

broncojeff · Sep 17, 2013

Can you adjust the radar to show a timeframe longer than 20 minutes?

sulpfiction · Sep 17, 2013

GIZBUG said:
$2.99 for this, when I can get a "trusted name" The Weather Channel, Yahoo Weather, or Accuweather for free? No Thanks.

Actually, Weather Channel app sucks, & Accuweather isn't much better. To cluttered, too many ads. I actually have this app and it's replaced every other weather app on my phone. It's super clean, and just about perfect. That being said, I haven't used the new app in ios7. But for $2.99, this app is fantastic.

----------

nutmac said:
(there's also + and - slider, but I have no idea what it does)

Changes the opacity of the overlaid selection.

d-klumpp · Sep 17, 2013

Free apps are like free music

nutmac said:
WeatherBug: the free version is ad supported. Ad-free version costs $2.99

Weather Uunderground: ad supported. To remove ads, you need to pay $1.99 per year subscription.

Forecast.io website is a promotional tool to get developers sign up and pay for access to its API and it has ads from Fusion. And like you said, while it is nice, it's a website, not an app.

If you want free ad-supported apps, you can use one of thousands of apps out there or stick to Apple's built-in Weather app. If you want ad-free, you gotta pay as developers need to feed themselves and often need to pay for access to weather data.

I support developers by buying decent apps, and I gladly pay to have an ad-free experience.

My go-to weather app is WeatherBug Elite because of the density of reporting stations. As a cyclist living in Chicago, I know that conditions often vary greatly over short distances going away from the lake or north-to-south, so the conditions at O'Hare are of no interest. For my money, any app that only gives info from a single reporting station is useless in any place that has local effects (i.e., pretty much everywhere).

Dave

DocStone · Sep 17, 2013

Are you the sarcasm police? My comment was not sarcastic. I was just making an observation. MR does this often and it gets kinda old. Don't like, just move on.

This is a place for Mac rumors not advertising apps. Perhaps an app review site would be a better fit or place this in the forum. It has no place on the front page

BTW, I know this site if free and I have given financially to support it in the past. What have you done other than police?

Chill out.

keysofanxiety said:
Why the sarcastic comment? This site is free and they're showing an application that some people may find useful -- MR have, on multiple occasions, state that they don't advertise apps for profit.

Other people may find this app useful, and I myself have checked out a lot of apps that MR have previously demonstrated -- as I wouldn't have found them otherwise.

Sometimes I feel 90% of comments these days are just a rush to get the first sarcastic comment, adding absolutely nothing to the discussion.

----------

OllyW said:
MacRumors doesn't do paid promotions without disclosing the fact.

https://macrumors.zendesk.com/hc/en-us#Are_news_stories_really_advertising_in_disguise.3F

First off, thanks for being a Mod. Secondly, just because it's in the guidelines does not mean that they follow it. I have seen quite a bit of suspicious things over the years that have made me question MR. It just too convenient.

Siria said they did not have chemical weapons....

Now, pardon me while I take off my foil hat.

thefourthpope · Sep 17, 2013

I've never found the need for a pro-style weather app, but this UI looks great. I hate the cluttered ad-bloated look of so many basic ones. I'll probably pick this up with os7

jclo · Sep 17, 2013

DocStone said:
Are you the sarcasm police? My comment was not sarcastic. I was just making an observation. MR does this often and it gets kinda old. Don't like, just move on.

This is a place for Mac rumors not advertising apps. Perhaps an app review site would be a better fit or place this in the forum. It has no place on the front page

BTW, I know this site if free and I have given financially to support it in the past. What have you done other than police?

Chill out.

----------

First off, thanks for being a Mod. Secondly, just because it's in the guidelines does not mean that they follow it. I have seen quite a bit of suspicious things over the years that have made me question MR. It just too convenient.

Siria said they did not have chemical weapons....

Now, pardon me while I take off my foil hat.

We do indeed follow the guidelines. We do not post undisclosed paid stories.

btdpi007 · Sep 17, 2013

I'm a mark for weather apps, I've bought (and downloaded free) more than I'd care to admit... or tell my wife. For an "at a glance" type weather app, Perfect Weather, is really good. I think the UI is pretty good. It has weather alerts, but it doesn't look like you get a push notification (although I could be wrong).

I have no issues with paying for good software, and $2.99 is pretty much a steal. I still remember a time when all commercial software started at around $29.99 and even shareware found at your local "Games 'n Gadgets" or "Electronics Boutique" was around $10. Honestly, I'd prefer to pay for apps/software than get ad-support and/or bloatware.

Enjoy Perfect Weather... it's pretty good.

E.Lizardo · Sep 17, 2013

nagromme said:
I'll keep it in mind, but Universal and Dark Sky "future radar" are features I look for.

Dark sky is amazing.Reminds me of the scene in Back to the Future2 when Doc Brown looks at his watch and says the rain should be stopping now...and it stops.Don't care for the colors on the radar view though.Love it anyway.

canyonblue737 · Sep 18, 2013

johnparjr said:
The new weather app in ios7 is great too

It is great but doesn't have radar. Many folks, like myself, need and want radar.

'Perfect Weather' Offers Detailed Weather Forecasts at a Glance

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