Is The Weather Channel accurate?
Weather.com and its app, run by The Weather Company, one of the most-visited weather services in the US.
The Weather Channel does not publish exactly how its forecast is made, so its accuracy cannot be independently verified. What we can grade is the open models, which we score directly on this page. Watching those models is the honest way to judge it.
How The Weather Channel makes its forecast. The Weather Company, which runs weather.com and The Weather Channel app, says every forecast it issues is informed by its own GRAF model. It does not publish how GRAF is combined with other data, so its forecast cannot be graded independently. That matters, because it means no one outside The Weather Channel can check its forecast against the recorded weather the way we check the open models.
Our verdict. A polished product on top of The Weather Company's own GRAF forecast. Since no one outside can verify that forecast, comparing the open models directly - as we do - is the honest way to judge accuracy.
Which forecast is most accurate in the US?
CheckWeather Score, graded against the weather that actually happened
The CheckWeather Score blends temperature, wind and rain accuracy, each measured against ERA5 (the recorded weather) over the last 30 days across 1999 cities. Lower error means a higher score. Apple Weather lists ECMWF and the US National Weather Service/NOAA among its data sources. What each big weather app says about its forecast.