Weather Symbols

Click any symbol to copy it: ☀ U+2600 sun, ☁ U+2601 cloud, ☂ U+2602 umbrella, ☔ U+2614 rain, ❄ U+2744 snowflake, ⚡ U+26A1 lightning, ☈ U+2608 thunderstorm, 🌫 U+1F32B fog. The map section covers cloud cover (0–8 oktas: ○ clear, ◑ 4/8, ● overcast), fronts, wind barbs (half barb 5 kt, full barb 10 kt, pennant 50 kt), station-model pressure codes (138 = 1013.8 hPa) and WMO present-weather codes 00–99.

Use the Weather Symbols

64 symbols

Cloud cover symbols (oktas)

The station circle is filled in proportion to the sky covered, in eighths (oktas). Unicode only has characters for some of them.

Oktas Map symbol Unicode Meaning METAR
0 Sky clear SKC / CLR
1 1/8 covered FEW
2 2/8 covered FEW
3 none 3/8 covered SCT
4 4/8 (half) covered SCT
5 none 5/8 covered BKN
6 6/8 covered BKN
7 none 7/8 covered BKN
8 Overcast OVC
9 Sky obscured (fog, snow, smoke) VV
/ none Missing / not observed —

Weather front and pressure symbols

Triangles and half circles point in the direction the front is moving.

Cold front

Blue line with triangles on the side it moves toward. Cold air advancing; brief heavy showers, wind shift, temperature drop.

Warm front

Red line with half circles. Warm air advancing; widespread steady rain or drizzle ahead of it.

Stationary front

Alternating red half circles and blue triangles on opposite sides. Neither air mass is advancing.

Occluded front

Purple line with alternating triangles and half circles on the same side. A cold front has overtaken a warm front.

Trough

Dashed line (often brown or orange): an elongated area of low pressure, often with clouds and showers.

Squall line

Dash-dot-dot line: a line of active thunderstorms with strong gusts.

HL

High and low pressure centers. Isobars (thin lines of equal pressure) are drawn every 4 hPa; closer isobars mean stronger wind.

Wind barbs

The shaft points into the wind (the direction it blows from). Speeds are rounded to the nearest 5 knots. Barbs are drawn for the Northern Hemisphere.

Calm (< 3 kt)
5 kt — half barb
10 kt — 1 full barb
15 kt — full + half
25 kt — 2 full + half
50 kt — pennant
65 kt — pennant + full + half
105 kt — 2 pennants + half

Station model

How one weather station is plotted on a surface map (US NWS layout).

72 58 138 +12/ •• wind from NW, 15 kt temp (upper left) · dew point (lower left) weather left · pressure & tendency right
  • 72 — temperature (°F in the US, °C elsewhere).
  • 58 — dew point.
  • •• — present weather: continuous slight rain (ww 61).
  • Half-filled circle — 4 oktas of cloud.
  • Barb — wind from the northwest at 15 kt (one full, one half barb).
  • 138 — sea-level pressure 1013.8 hPa.
  • +12/ — pressure rose 1.2 hPa in 3 hours, steadily.

WMO present-weather codes (ww 00–99)

WMO Manual on Codes, code table 4677. Plot symbols are plain-character approximations of the WMO glyphs: • rain, , drizzle, ✱ snow, ▽ shower, ≡ fog, ☈ thunderstorm, ▲ hail, ~ freezing.

ww Plot (approx.) Present weather
00–19 No precipitation, fog or storm at the station now
00 Cloud development not observed or not observable
01 Clouds generally dissolving or becoming less developed
02 State of sky on the whole unchanged
03 Clouds generally forming or developing
04 Visibility reduced by smoke (forest fires, industrial smoke, volcanic ash)
05 ∞ Haze
06 Widespread dust in suspension, not raised by wind at or near the station
07 Dust or sand raised by wind at or near the station (no whirls or storm); blowing spray at sea
08 Well-developed dust or sand whirls in the past hour or now, no duststorm
09 Duststorm or sandstorm within sight, or at the station in the past hour
10 ═ Mist
11 ≡ Patches of shallow fog or ice fog (below about 2 m on land, 10 m at sea)
12 ≡ More or less continuous shallow fog or ice fog
13 Lightning visible, no thunder heard
14 Precipitation within sight, not reaching the ground or sea (virga)
15 Precipitation within sight, reaching the ground, more than 5 km away
16 Precipitation within sight, reaching the ground, near but not at the station
17 ☈ Thunderstorm, but no precipitation at the time of observation
18 Squalls at or within sight of the station in the past hour or now
19 )( Funnel cloud(s) — tornado or waterspout — in the past hour or now
20–29 Weather in the past hour, not now
20 Past hour, not now: drizzle (not freezing) or snow grains, not showers
21 Past hour, not now: rain (not freezing), not showers
22 Past hour, not now: snow, not showers
23 Past hour, not now: rain and snow or ice pellets, not showers
24 Past hour, not now: freezing drizzle or freezing rain
25 Past hour, not now: rain shower(s)
26 Past hour, not now: snow shower(s), or rain and snow showers
27 Past hour, not now: hail shower(s), or rain and hail
28 Past hour, not now: fog or ice fog
29 Past hour, not now: thunderstorm (with or without precipitation)
30–39 Dust, sand, drifting or blowing snow
30 Slight or moderate duststorm or sandstorm, decreased in the past hour
31 Slight or moderate duststorm or sandstorm, no appreciable change
32 Slight or moderate duststorm or sandstorm, began or increased
33 Severe duststorm or sandstorm, decreased in the past hour
34 Severe duststorm or sandstorm, no appreciable change
35 Severe duststorm or sandstorm, began or increased
36 Slight or moderate drifting snow, generally low (below eye level)
37 Heavy drifting snow, generally low
38 Slight or moderate blowing snow, generally high (above eye level)
39 Heavy blowing snow, generally high
40–49 Fog or ice fog now
40 ≡ Fog or ice fog at a distance, not at the station in the past hour
41 ≡ Fog or ice fog in patches
42 ≡ Fog or ice fog, sky visible, has become thinner in the past hour
43 ≡ Fog or ice fog, sky invisible, has become thinner
44 ≡ Fog or ice fog, sky visible, no appreciable change
45 ≡ Fog or ice fog, sky invisible, no appreciable change
46 ≡ Fog or ice fog, sky visible, began or became thicker
47 ≡ Fog or ice fog, sky invisible, began or became thicker
48 ≡ Fog depositing rime, sky visible
49 ≡ Fog depositing rime, sky invisible
50–59 Drizzle
50 , Drizzle, not freezing, intermittent, slight
51 , Drizzle, not freezing, continuous, slight
52 , Drizzle, not freezing, intermittent, moderate
53 , Drizzle, not freezing, continuous, moderate
54 , Drizzle, not freezing, intermittent, heavy (dense)
55 , Drizzle, not freezing, continuous, heavy (dense)
56 ~, Freezing drizzle, slight
57 ~, Freezing drizzle, moderate or heavy
58 ,• Drizzle and rain, slight
59 ,• Drizzle and rain, moderate or heavy
60–69 Rain
60 • Rain, not freezing, intermittent, slight
61 • Rain, not freezing, continuous, slight
62 • Rain, not freezing, intermittent, moderate
63 • Rain, not freezing, continuous, moderate
64 • Rain, not freezing, intermittent, heavy
65 • Rain, not freezing, continuous, heavy
66 ~• Freezing rain, slight
67 ~• Freezing rain, moderate or heavy
68 •✱ Rain or drizzle and snow, slight
69 •✱ Rain or drizzle and snow, moderate or heavy
70–79 Snow and other solid precipitation, not showers
70 ✱ Snow, intermittent, slight
71 ✱ Snow, continuous, slight
72 ✱ Snow, intermittent, moderate
73 ✱ Snow, continuous, moderate
74 ✱ Snow, intermittent, heavy
75 ✱ Snow, continuous, heavy
76 ↔ Diamond dust (ice prisms), with or without fog
77 △ Snow grains, with or without fog
78 ✱ Isolated star-like snow crystals, with or without fog
79 △ Ice pellets
80–90 Showers
80 ▽• Rain shower(s), slight
81 ▽• Rain shower(s), moderate or heavy
82 ▽• Rain shower(s), violent
83 ▽•✱ Showers of rain and snow mixed, slight
84 ▽•✱ Showers of rain and snow mixed, moderate or heavy
85 ▽✱ Snow shower(s), slight
86 ▽✱ Snow shower(s), moderate or heavy
87 ▽△ Showers of snow pellets or small hail, slight
88 ▽△ Showers of snow pellets or small hail, moderate or heavy
89 ▽▲ Showers of hail, no thunder, slight
90 ▽▲ Showers of hail, no thunder, moderate or heavy
91–99 Thunderstorms
91 ☈• Thunderstorm in the past hour; slight rain now
92 ☈• Thunderstorm in the past hour; moderate or heavy rain now
93 ☈✱ Thunderstorm in the past hour; slight snow, rain and snow, or hail now
94 ☈✱ Thunderstorm in the past hour; moderate or heavy snow, rain and snow, or hail now
95 ☈ Thunderstorm, slight or moderate, with rain and/or snow, no hail
96 ☈▲ Thunderstorm, slight or moderate, with hail
97 ☈ Thunderstorm, heavy, with rain and/or snow, no hail
98 ☈ Thunderstorm with duststorm or sandstorm
99 ☈▲ Thunderstorm, heavy, with hail

Sources: WMO-No. 306, Manual on Codes, Vol. I.1; NOAA WPC station plot guide; Unicode Miscellaneous Symbols chart.

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Summary

Two references in one page. First, a copy-and-paste set of Unicode weather symbols grouped by sun and sky, clouds, rain, snow and ice, wind and storms, fog, temperature, and the plain characters used to approximate weather-map plots, each with its codepoint and HTML entity. Second, the symbols on a surface weather map as defined by the World Meteorological Organization and the US National Weather Service: cloud cover in oktas, fronts and pressure features, wind barbs, the station model with a pressure-code decoder and a wind-barb drawer, and the full 00–99 table of WMO present-weather (ww) codes.

How it works

  1. Click a category or type in the search box (e.g. rain, snow, U+26A1) to filter the Unicode symbols, then click a symbol to copy it.
  2. Switch to table view to see each symbol's name, meaning, codepoint and HTML entity side by side.
  3. Use the cloud cover table to read station circles: each eighth (okta) of sky covered fills more of the circle.
  4. Enter a wind direction and speed to draw the matching wind barb: pennant = 50 kt, full barb = 10 kt, half barb = 5 kt.
  5. Decode a 3-digit station-model pressure: values under 500 get a leading 10, others a leading 9 (138 → 1013.8 hPa, 982 → 998.2 hPa).
  6. Filter the 100 WMO present-weather codes by number or word (e.g. 61, freezing, hail).

Use cases

  • Paste ☀ ☁ ☔ ❄ ⚡ into posts, emails, spreadsheets, apps and forecasts.
  • Read a surface analysis chart: fronts, highs and lows, troughs and dry lines.
  • Decode a plotted station: temperature, dew point, pressure, cloud cover, wind and present weather.
  • Look up the meaning of a WMO ww code in SYNOP data or weather APIs.
  • Teach or study meteorology symbols for a class, pilot training or a ham radio net.
  • Find the Unicode codepoint and HTML entity of a weather character for web or app code.

Frequently Asked Questions

Last updated: 2026-10-10 · Reviewed by Nham Vu