To check the weather somewhere you aren’t, you can add a location to the Weather app in Windows 10. Want to see what the weather’s like in your destination city before you get on that plane? Here’s how to add a location:
If the built-in Windows 10 Weather app isn't quite your cup of tea, you can always look in the store for alternatives and you'll definitely come across The Weather Channel.
1From the Start screen, open the Weather app if it isn't already open. With the Weather app on the screen, select the Show Options button to expand the app bar and see the option names.
As shown, the Weather app bar appears on the left side of the screen.
2Select the Places button on the app bar.
The Places screen appears. Your screen will show a different live tile.
3Select the Add Favorite Places tile, which looks like a plus in a square.
The Add to Favorites screen appears.
4Type a location name, such as a city, in the box under Enter Location.
As you type, matching location names appear below the box. If you see the location you want, select that name to add a tile for that location to the Places screen. No need to click the Add button, unless your location does not appear automatically.
You can add other locations by repeating Steps 3 and 4.
5Select the tile for the location you added. The Weather app displays full information for the location you selected.
You can switch among multiple locations by using the Places button on the app bar.
6Return to the Start screen.
Your new favorite location does not appear on the Weather tile — yet. Select the Weather tile to return to the weather app. You see your new favorite location, as shown. In addition to the app bar on the left side of the screen, an app bar for the selected location appears along the top of the screen.
7Select the Pin button at the top of the screen.
Selecting this button adds a tile for the current location to the Start screen. (If you don’t see the Pin button, repeat Steps 2–5 to add a favorite location.)
8Return to the Start screen.
The original Weather tile appears, as well as the new tile. You may have to scroll downward to see the new Weather tile.
9Select the new Weather tile to open the app with that location. Display the app bar for Weather.
Select the Unpin button at the top of the screen to remove the tile for the current location from the Start screen. If the Unpin button doesn’t appear, repeat Step 7.
10Return to the Start screen. The location you unpinned no longer appears.
Add locations for friends, family, and travel destinations and pin these new locations to the Start screen.
Though weather forecasting is a notoriously inexact science, thanks to voice assistants, pop-up notifications, and buzzing smartwatches, it’s easier than ever to keep tabs on the day’s weather (and dress accordingly). Of course, checking the truncated weather forecast on your phone might be convenient, but it could also mean you’re losing out on valuable information that could help you deal with the heat, sleet, or general mugginess outside. That’s where desktop weather apps come in.
While you might be overwhelmed with the number of weather apps in the Mac App Store or Windows Store, only a handful are both beautiful in presentation and rich in data. Here are the best ways to check the weather from your Windows 10 or macOS computer.
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Windows: MSN Weather and The Weather Channel
MSN Weather
Windows 10 includes its own free weather app, MSN Weather, and it’s not bad. It benefits from Windows 10’s customizable live tile feature, which displays updating information about your local forecast at a glance when you check out your Start menu. That means you don’t have to open an app to see the weather, you just have to hit the Windows key.
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MSN Weather presents the current forecast, along with the projected summary of the next ten days. Information like visibility, dew point, and barometric pressure is also included. You can look at a satellite view of your region to see any upcoming storms, or observe recent weather patterns.
In addition, MSN Weather shows you a ton of additional information designed to appeal to paranoid amateur meteorologists. You can make note of sunrise and sunset times (perfect for finding the golden hour for photos), and get a sense of what to expect thanks to the inclusion of historical precipitation and temperature data, informing you of the likelihood of rain on a particular day over a 30-year period.
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The Weather Channel
The Weather Channel’s free Windows 10 app might appeal to allergy sufferers more than weather buffs. It includes the same weather forecast information you’d find in MSN Weather, and supports the same customizable live tile feature.
Forecast Bar Puts a Ton of Weather Info In Your Mac's Menu Bar
Mac: Weather is a fickle thing, but if you like to stay on top of it from your Mac, you don’t have…
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The Health section shares information like tree, grass, and weed pollen estimates, as well as flu activity (it’s winter, so the flu activity graph was in the red). You can also configure The Weather Channel to send you pollen, rain, or severe weather alerts based on your location, convenient if you’re one to forget to ask your PC yourself. That feature alone might be worth a look. It isn’t the prettiest app, however. It displays today’s forecast in a big bold display, but forces you to scroll down to get at other important information, and allows unrelated news articles to take up precious space.
Mac:Forecast Bar is Best in Show
While Windows 10 has a robust built-in weather app, macOS isn’t so lucky. There’s a weather app that displays the general forecast in your notification center, but it lacks the information needed to get a sense of the coming day or week. If you want a more convenient way to get your weather info, along with more weather information in general, Forecast Bar should be the app to go for. We’ve written about Forecast Bar in the past, and still think it’s one of the best weather apps for your Mac.
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It lives in your menu bar, and provides tons more information than your Mac’s default weather service. You can have your weather data presented in the dock or menu bar, and see animated forecasts based on weather data provided by Dark Sky.
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You can see information like sunrise and sunset times, historical weather patterns, humidity, dew point, and more. The app’s also easy on the eyes, making it a great addition to your Mac app library. At $9.99 it’s a bit pricey, and additional in-app purchases are available to increase the frequency of weather updates (Forecast Bar updates hourly). Even so, if you’re tired of getting rained on, Forecast Bar might be the weather app you need to stay dry.