Fire + Rain is a gorgeous weather app for iOS. It may not pack in the most weather data nor do so as efficiently as it could, but its elegance shines through. Those who want basic information about the day or work week would do well to give this weather app a go.
Download Fire + Rain for iOS:
➤ Fire + Rain in the App Store (free)
In 2017, it’s extremely hard to argue that there is an even slight shortage of weather apps in the App Store. Just searching “weather” brings up hundreds if not thousands of results. Yet more seem to pour in every single day. Developers always think they have the perfect weather app whether by sheer number of features or the most impressive UI. Fire + Rain is yet another new weather app that clearly tries tackling the latter goal.
Fire + Rain has one of the most unique, yet gorgeous designs I’ve seen in a weather app. It almost feels like something that would fit in on a Windows Phone device. It comes with three themes: fire, rain, and Earth — each just change the color palette a bit.
Fire + Rain’s Gorgeous Design
Navigating Fire + Rain is largely done using gestures. Double-tapping anywhere on the screen switches between forecasts: hourly, the next 36 hours, or a full 14 days. Then swiping up and down scrolls through the timeline for that forecast. For instance, swiping through the 14-day forecast advances the weather details per day while swiping through hourly advances them per hour.
With each swipe, a new background takes over to express the weather conditions for that timeframe. If it’s going to rain, you’ll get a dark blue with some light rain drops. If it’s sunny, the background is a gentle orange. These colors will also depend on which theme you use, but I’m using the default which is fire — both by name and by colloquial description.
The app lists hours or days you already scrolled by on the right. They elegantly fade into the background the further along the timeline you browse. I also appreciate how an animation follows my finger as I swipe. It almost looks like I’m lightly ragging my finger through water.
Fire + Rain displays the weather conditions for the given time on the bottom along with an ellipsis to expand further details. Underneath that you can tap the current displayed location to change it or the search icon to find a new one.
Weather and Forecasts
If you’re looking for an in-depth weather app complete with radars and data customizations, you’ve come to the wrong place. Fire + Rain is not a weather app for the “pros” and it doesn’t try to be one. Instead, it gives you the basic information you need to get through the day.
Before you scroll through hours and days, Fire + Rain gives you current conditions at a glance. You can see the current temperature, what it feels like and a brief description of the weather. If you tap the ellipsis, you also get wind, wind gust, humidity and pressure. For periods when precipitation is possible, the app also gives you measurements for predicted rain and snowfall.
The app description in the App Store also says that push notifications let you know when rain or snow is coming down to the nearest 10 minutes. I didn’t get to test this out because it’s been pretty calm where I am, but I imagine it works similarly to Dark Sky.
Speaking of which, unlike many other third-party weather apps, Fire + Rain doesn’t get its data from the Dark Sky API. The Weather Network powers the app instead. TWN actually makes one of my favorite Apple TV weather apps both in terms of UI and accuracy, so I have no doubts that translates well here.
When compared to Dark Sky and data from The Weather Channel, Fire + Rain’s forecasts were quite similar. It’s hard to find wildly inaccurate weather apps nowadays anyway. Plus, if one forecast is inaccurate, they tend to all miss the mark. We all know that happens from time to time as well.
Gorgeous Isn’t Always Ideal
As pretty as Fire + Rain is, I do have one complaint about the UI. All the scrolling means it takes much longer to get the information you’re looking for. In other weather apps, you can pop in, get an immediate glance at the week, and pop out. Because Fire + Rain only shows one day at a time, that’s not possible here. You have to scroll to get to a specific day or hour, and even then you may miss it and have to go back.
It’s not a huge concern if you aren’t in a rush, but does have a noticeable delay compared to other apps. This is one aspect of Fir + Rain that seems to prefer form over function.
Ultimately, Fire + Rain is a gorgeous weather app for iOS. It may not pack in the most weather data nor do so as efficiently as it could, but its elegance shines through. Those who want basic information about the day or work week would do well to give this free app a go.
Download Fire + Rain for iOS:
➤ Fire + Rain in the App Store (free)
