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What each radar setting does

The StormGrid radar has more than thirty controls. This page explains all of them: what each layer shows, when it is worth turning on, and whether it needs a free account or a subscription.

Free with no account

The rain itself and how it is drawn — colour scheme, smoothing, opacity and base map — plus the whole animation, radar coverage, borders and place names. The safety layers are open to everyone too: Met Office thunderstorm warning areas, Environment Agency flood warnings, and real lightning strikes. Anything that answers whether it is raining, whether it is about to, or whether you are in danger stays free.

With a free account

Rain accumulation totals, the current-weather overlay, tapping the map for conditions at an exact point, and UK air quality. There is nothing to pay for these.

Radar Pro

Precipitation type, Environment Agency rain gauges, road and motorway risk, windstream, the world storm tracker, fire detections, weather stations, and the five-minute European radar feed. Pro + Charts adds the EUMETSAT satellite layer.

What we tell you up front

Every real limitation is written next to the feature rather than left to be discovered later: smoothing only applies above a certain zoom, flood warnings and rain gauges cover England only, road risk is a derived advisory rather than an official warning, and the predictive nowcast has no data feed behind it yet.