Satellite Weather
Satellite Weather
A reference for everything in Satellite Weather — coverage and cadence, the satellite channels and RGB products, overlay data sources, analysis tools, and keyboard shortcuts. New here? Start at the overview, or launch the viewer.
Imagery is generated for dozens of geographic regions, from full-hemisphere views down to regional, state, and metro-area crops. Every product is available across every domain.
| Domain | Coverage | Update Cadence |
|---|---|---|
| Full Disk | Entire Western Hemisphere from GOES — best for hurricanes and large-scale patterns | Every 10 minutes |
| CONUS | Continental United States — the daily workhorse | Every 5 minutes |
| Mesoscale 1 & 2 | Targeted 1-minute sectors aimed at active severe weather or fires by the NWS | Every 1 minute |
| Regional / Sub-regional | West, Central, East US, Northwest, Great Lakes, Southeast, and more | Matches parent domain |
| State & Metro | Individual states and local metro zoom presets | Matches parent domain |
| Ocean & Tropical Sectors | Atlantic, Pacific, Caribbean, and extratropical ocean regions | Matches parent domain |
The ABI instrument captures 16 spectral channels ranging from visible to longwave infrared. Single-channel views show one wavelength directly. RGB composite products combine two or three channels into false-color images designed to highlight specific phenomena.
| Product | What It Shows |
|---|---|
| GeoColor | True color by day; IR-shaded with city lights at night. Best all-purpose view. |
| Sandwich | Visible texture with IR cloud-top temperatures — excellent for severe convection by day. |
| AirMass | Color-codes air masses: warm/moist green, dry/stratospheric red, cold polar blue. Reveals fronts, dry slots, and tropopause folds. |
| Day Cloud Phase | Colors clouds by height and phase near initiation — useful for tracking convective trends. |
| Night Microphysics | Nighttime analog to Day Cloud Phase — low clouds cyan, mid-level yellow, high clouds red-purple. |
| Day Land Cloud Fire | Natural color with land changes and fire detection — burn scars, healthy vegetation, and active fires in one view. |
| Fire Temperature | Quantitative fire intensity from shortwave IR — brighter means hotter. |
| Day Snow / Fog | Snow appears red-pink; fog and low cloud appear pale purple. Daytime only. |
| Night Snow / Fog | Fog and low clouds as blue-cyan; high clouds black. Nighttime only. |
| Dust | Blowing dust and volcanic ash plumes highlighted in magenta. |
| Split Window Difference | Channel 14 minus 15 — low-level moisture gradients and dust front signatures. |
All 16 ABI channels are available, spanning blue visible (0.47 μm) through CO₂ infrared (13.3 μm). Key channels: Channel 2 (0.64 μm red visible, 0.5 km resolution) for daytime detail; Channel 7 (3.9 μm shortwave IR) for fire hot spots; Channels 8–10 (water vapor triplet at 6.2, 6.9, 7.3 μm) for moisture and jet-stream analysis; Channel 13 (10.3 μm clean IR) as the primary nighttime and storm-intensity channel.
| Overlay | Source | Products |
|---|---|---|
| GLM Lightning | GOES Geostationary Lightning Mapper via AWS | Flash density, individual flash points, minimum flash area |
| NWS Warnings | NWS via Iowa Environmental Mesonet | Tornado warnings, severe thunderstorm warnings, flash flood warnings, watches |
| MRMS Radar | NOAA Multi-Radar Multi-Sensor via AWS | Composite reflectivity overlaid on satellite imagery |
| SPC Products | Storm Prediction Center | Day 1–2 convective outlooks (categorical + probabilistic tornado/wind/hail), mesoscale discussions |
| WPC Products | Weather Prediction Center | Excessive rainfall outlook (Day 1–3), mesoscale precipitation discussions |
| ProbSevere | NOAA/CIMSS | Per-storm probability of severe weather (hail, wind, tornado) in next 60 minutes |
| METAR Plots | Aviation Weather Center | Surface observations — wind barbs, temperature, dewpoint, pressure, sky cover |
| RTMA | NOAA Real-Time Mesoscale Analysis via AWS | 2m temperature, 2m dewpoint, 10m wind barbs (CONUS, Alaska, Hawaii grids) |
| RAP Model | Rapid Refresh via AWS | Temperature, geopotential height, relative humidity, wind barbs, omega — at 925, 850, 700, 500, 300 mb |
Draw cold fronts, warm fronts, occluded fronts, stationary fronts, troughs, drylines, pressure centers (L/H), and freehand lines. Add text labels. Adjustable color and line weight. Drawings are included in screenshots and GIF exports.
Hover over any point on the image to read channel values — most useful on IR channels to get cloud-top brightness temperature in real units. Pairs with the colorbar scale toggle.
Click two points to measure the distance in kilometers, miles, and nautical miles. Uses domain-aware scaling for accuracy across all region sizes.
Pin a location on the map and chart its value over the full animation loop. Useful for tracking storm intensification, fire growth, or fog burn-off at a fixed point.
Show two or four products side by side, time-locked to the same frame. Common combo: Sandwich + Channel 13 + MRMS + GLM in a quad for complete storm-scale analysis.
Export a static screenshot or animated GIF of the current loop, including any drawings and overlays. Adjust frame count and speed before exporting for social-media-ready files.
The playback bar spans the bottom of the viewer. Play, pause, step frame by frame, or scrub to any time. Each frame is labeled with UTC and local time. Loop settings (speed, frame count, dwell on last frame, rock/oscillate mode) are configurable via the gear icon — and loop settings are saved as part of a favorite so each saved view can have its own playback style.
| Key | Action |
|---|---|
| Space | Play / Pause animation |
| ← / → | Step one frame back / forward |
| Home / End | Jump to first / latest frame |
| F | Toggle fullscreen |
| R | Toggle rock (oscillate) mode |
| S | Open loop settings |
| D | Open drawing tools |
| I | Toggle pixel inspector |
| T | Toggle time series chart |
| Esc | Close any active panel or modal |
The backend runs on a Linux server that continuously processes raw GOES ABI Level 1b data from NOAA's public AWS buckets. Each processing cycle:
The web viewer and mobile apps load these pre-rendered images. No heavy processing happens in your browser — the viewer is fast on any device, including older phones.
See plans & pricing and account details on the overview page, or jump straight in — no account required to start.
Launch Satellite WeatherNative iOS and Android apps are also available.
Questions, bug reports, feedback, or privacy requests? Email us at support@satellitewx.com and we'll get back to you.