It’s finally here! Introducing the Space City Weather app

I’m very excited to announce today that our brand new app is available for download immediately. Dwight Silverman, who wrote this introductory post, and the developer, Hussain Abbasi, worked through the entirety of Memorial Day weekend to complete this app for the beginning of the Atlantic hurricane season. We strived to deliver a product that is simple, powerful, and just a tad whimsical. I hope you like it. Here’s Dwight with more …

The Space City Weather app was designed to be easy to use and focus on the content available from the site, while quickly providing you with the weather information you need at a glance. It’s also intensely Houston-centric – which is why, for example, you’ll find humidity sharing equal billing with the current temperature atop the home screen.

Because if you live in Houston, it’s always about the humidity.

The app is divided into three simple screens. At the top of the initial screen are current conditions, the hourly forecast and the most-recent Space City Weather posts. As you scroll down, you’ll see a seven-day forecast and the current radar from the National Weather Service.

Because the metro Houston area is so vast, you can choose from one of five zones closest to you for forecasts and conditions. Just tap the city name at the top to switch between Houston (Bush Intercontinental Airport), Hobby Airport, Conroe, Galveston and Katy. You’ll have to do this manually, because we’re not tracking your location. (Hey, if you’re making your third trip to Shipley’s today, that’s your business, not ours.)

Tapping the middle icon at the bottom takes you to an index of the past week’s SCW posts. Tapping on any of those—including the posts featured on the first screen—will let you read them in their entirety in the app.

The third screen is for those who want easy access to weather discussions from the National Weather Service, which are written by forecasters at the agency’s office in League City. We think this provides a nice supplement to Space City Weather, and offers a slightly more technical analysis of the forecast. It updates several times a day. In this feed you’ll get the short and long form discussions, as well as specialty reports for marine and aviation interests. When the NWS issues weather alerts, those appear at the top of this screen, based on which zone you set on the home screen.

At the top right of the NWS screen is a gear icon that takes you to settings, including controls for which push notifications you’ll receive. Now, there’s no more need to check your email or Facebook to find out when we’ve updated during a storm. You can also control how many posts are retained, and learn more about the SCW Flood Scale.

Our app doesn’t try to replace detailed, general weather or radar apps you already may have on your mobile device. We’re not a huge business with resources for that. So the app brings you the weather you need to know specific to the Houston area, as well as Eric and Matt’s expert insights.

One other thing we want to emphasize: There are no ads, no in-app purchases, no tracking or hoovering of your personal information. We gather diagnostic data to make sure the app is working properly, and that’s it. We respect your privacy.

It’s available for both Android and iOS devices, and the two are functionally identical. We’d like to thank Hussain Abbasi, who developed the app for us with a grant from Arnold Ventures, and our ongoing sponsorship by Reliant. Thanks to their support, and your generous donations during our annual fundraiser, the app is free, and always will be.

This is version 1.0 of this app, and we welcome your suggestions for updates and improvements. As you make suggestions please think local and simple.

And if you spot any bugs (yes, we know there is one with the radar on iOS right now), please report them to [email protected]. We may not be able to respond to each report, but we’ll take a close look at them all.

As always, thanks for being part of the SCW community, and enjoy the app!

124 thoughts on “It’s finally here! Introducing the Space City Weather app”

    • Great job! Of course we all knew that it would be great. Thanks for all y’all do to inform…sans the drama.

  3. App looks great. What is the “Evacuate Katy” notification option? Lol…

  7. This is great…already downloaded and will definitely get daily use. Thanks for all the effort on this.

  8. When you all promo’d the app a while back I had trouble conceiving what you could put on there that was any different than any other weather app. Admittedly I was very short sighted! Love all the content you are providing and can’t wait to start using it!!

    Thanks for all you all do for #HTX!!

  9. Congratulations! The app is simple and brings a lot of information. I would only add a dark theme mode.

  12. I really don’t understand what the app gives me that the site doesn’t. It is confusing. What am I missing?

    • From my perspective, I don’t go directly to the site but rely on the email or Facebook updates for my information. Since Facebook is unreliable for timing and since at times I prefer the quick visual information to the lengthier posts, the app provides quicker access to the information.

  14. Awesome – been waiting for this! I know it’s new, but a dark mode would be great. Thanks!

  17. Awesome stuff- already downloaded the app. We live in Tomball- area code 77377- which “city” do you suggest I use – Houston, Conroe, Katy?

    Thanks again for the hard work

  18. Huzzah! Downloaded!

    It would be fun if someday the range could include the east side of the greater Houston area (Baytown?), too, as we follow you from way over in Liberty,…. but I understand it’s not all about me. 😀

    Thank you so much for this!

  21. This is great! I hope to see the Beaumont/Port Arthur area available eventually. We love you guys down here.

  25. I can’t delete the app. That’s a fairly serious problem. (Android, Samsung). I wanted to like it, but not having the option to delete it is a no-go.

  32. Love the app!! Congratulations on the launch.
    Only addition I would like to see is barometric pressure.

  33. Awesome. Whenever you can include the Sugar Land/ Richmond area that would be great.

  34. Thanks to each of you for your continued efforts and successes. Very excited for the new App. Keep up the great work……you provide a great service to our region……

    • Also daily rainfall amounts for each area. Galveston is often quite different as was the case with Harvey. Would be great if the amounts could be updated in regular intervals during the day but just the daily total would be a big plus.

  36. Just downloaded the app. As another comment suggested – will there be more granularity for location? By zip code? We live in NE Harris county but are 40 miles from Houston proper, and 40 miles from Conroe, so weather in “Houston” or Conroe is irrelevant for us.

  37. The other “typically Houston” is air quality. I want to know pollen, dust, contaminant levels each day for cycling. I prefer not to wear a mask, but I have to if the pollen and dust counts are up.

  38. Congratulations! Thank you! Downloaded it. Such a clean UI.

    “Evacuate Katy”.. LOL! Only weather app and team that keeps us laughing as well 🙂

  39. Love it! Though I would love to see smaller areas of town grouped. I’m in Humble, and my weather doesn’t always line up with inner loop but also doesn’t fit with Conroe!

  41. This is GREAT!!! sorry it took me 17 minutes to find it. Loaded and operating.

  42. Thank you SO much! We appreciate all you guys do–day in and day out. Rain or shine!

    • Thanks, loads! The usual reason for me checking on weather is whether to go to Baytown from West Houston or not in order to avoid heavy rains and flooding. I didn’t see that Baytown was included? Thank all of you for the on-going work.

  43. Love it!! Thank you for all of your work on this app and ALL that you do at Space City Weather!
    As you look at adding and adjusting, please consider adding a region in Fort Bend County or Pearland. There is a huge gap on the SW side of Houston between Katy and Galveston that isn’t being covered and your posts often refer to things as being “south of I10” or “west of 59” and none of those areas are covered in the regional options. Thanks again!

  45. The app is great! Thank you so much!! For those of us near downtown, is Hobby or Houston (Intercontinental) a better choice among the five options?

  48. FYI – I’ve really been looking forward to your app coming out. However, I just installed on my Samsung phone and it totally took over my view and uninstalled all of my app folders. Can you fix this?

  51. Looks great! My only request would be for a dark mode. That’s a LOT of white space…

  52. This is great! I would have paid for the app. Can your future updates include a Downtown Houston selection?

  53. I am so excited about this, I could cry! As a Harvey flood survivor, I will just never be the same when it comes to coastal weather. With two small children at home, I also need simple! Thanks so much for creating this for us!! And, I rest so much easier knowing that y’all are looking out for us as we head into another hurricane season. Thanks so much!!

  54. Well done, though, I prefer dew point. RH is less useful without the context of temperature, but give me the dew point and I’ll instantly know how comfortable it is out (personal preference and most prefer the more commonly used RH figure). Great rollout though and a tremendous thanks to all of those behind the scenes that worked, and continue to work, on this. I think this will be very beneficial for many.

  55. Looking good for a new app! I’m glad it’s out.

    Two suggestions, make the radar display clickable to either go to the NWS radar page or to make it a larger screen. The second suggestion is to add a current weather, with frontal information, to the site.

    Are there plans to add a sever weather section?

  56. You are all amazing! I rely on SCW, particularly during Atlantic Hurricane Season. Thanks for the app! I’m delighted.

  58. This is great! Thank you both for all you do, and for everyone that helped put this together. This is already my favorite weather app!

  59. Move over Accuweather, Weather Channel, Weatherbug, Radar scope, My radar, Dark Sky, mPing, NOAA, TXSC, and Live storms. It’s time for a new weather app, and luckily I got a phone with 256 GB.

  62. Okay, I’m an idiot, I guess. Do I go to the APPs store on my iPhone to download the app? If so, Space City Weather is not coming up. What am I doing wrong? Please, no judging…I’m super excited about this app.

    • Just click on the link that says iOS devices in the post introducing the app today.

  64. I do like the notifications instead of checking email. Good basic weather app. Modifications will be made going forward I’m sure to make it even better. For those readers looking for hyper local weather there’s a few apps out there if you do some research. Not going to name them I don’t want to detract from the rollout of the SCW app today haha.

  68. The SCW App is AMAZING! Great job from your IT guy & everyone on design, user experience, ease of use – I ❤️it. (From a fellow IT’er)

  69. I love it, thank you!! And thanks for the Evacuate Katy option, I needed a good laugh today. Great weather info and a good sense of humor too!

  72. Absolutely love it! My only suggestion (and deep desire) is a dark mode, for sure. Because I have everything in dark mode if I can.

  73. I absolutely love the app. Looks amazing clean, good, minimal interface. Very well done.

    Please, for the love of sensitive eyes, consider dark mode. The UI is so pretty, any external overlay is going to ruin it.

    Thanks again!

  75. Very nice, thanks!

    Upgrade suggestions:

    forecasted rainfall totals – both hourly and 10 day

    app feature: notification bar quick view/status — 1 row with current temp, current, humidity, day’s high/low, day’s precip %.

    app feature: dark mode

    app feature: in lieu of a fleshed out radar, could you do a customizable button to launch a 3rd party radar app?

  80. Just downloaded the new app. Looks gorgeous!
    Well designed. Looking forward to using it daily. Thank you!!

  81. So excited for this app!!!! Looks great guys. Thanks as always for all of your hard work!

  82. Great job. Suggestions for future versions: hurricane/tropical storm tracks, and include road flooding info from transtar.

  83. I have to admit that I was excited when I saw the email that the app is ready… not many apps that I truly get excited about! Thanks

  84. Glad it’s finally here and equally happy you don’t keep track of my Shipley’s trips.

  86. It would be nice if you could add a few more details to the seven-day forecast, such as percent precipitation probability.

  88. Thank you for the app. We depend on your forecasts! Please consider adding the Baytown area.

  89. Thank you for your hard work on this app! already downloaded it and definitely going to use!

  90. Humidity worthy of the front page! Enough said! Couldn’t (and looked) find that anywhere. Nice touch with the NWS discussion. That’s usually a read for me before “meeting” y’all to get the analytics behind the hype. Nice pyramid of summary down to supporting detail without using resources to duplicate what’s already done by others. That saves costs and stabilizes functionality.

    Now I’ll go download!

    • Nice fast overview radar. TWC’s Storm Radar is available to dig in. Clean look. Please don’t clutter with too many features which slow and get away from the spirit of the overview nature of the app.

  91. Great app! One question – what do we use for Memorial area (I-10 & 610 near IKEA). We aren’t near IAH and Katy seems too far out. Thanks!

  93. Love the new app but am I missing the % chance of rain? This detail is super helpful when deciding whether to chance an activity or cancel.

  94. Is awesome thank you!!! Is it just me? I can’t see comments!! Also rain % would be great!!!

  95. Its great! How about a link to flood gages harriscountryfws.com and a link to traffic/road updates showing high water etc drivetexas.org

  97. I love it!!! So simple. And HUMIDITY?? Finally!!
    User requests:
    Add Sugarland
    Dark mode
    Landscape mode
    More interactive radar
    % chance of rain

    I know all of this has already been requested, I’m just adding my votes. Regardless, I love it!!

  98. I would absolutely love it if you could allow us to pinpoint it by zip code instead of city, since some of us do not live in the cities you have listed and there’s about a 4 degrees difference in the cities listed. Also, would it be possible to be able to enlarge the radar so we can get a better view of the area in which we live or work?

  99. I’m just reading this wonderful news. Getting ready to download the app and excited to use it. Thank you and keep up the great work. We love y’all.

  100. See what happens if you select the Evacuate Katy notification multiple times… 🐔🐔🐔🤣🤣🤣 LOVE IT!! xo

    • Sorry, the cut off temperature is just an image in the article photo. My bad.

  103. Tha ms guys for the app. Looks great. I will use daily on my iOS phone. I would like to suggest you offer a color coded map for each of the 5 zones offered to help us locate the best area to select. Ie. I am in Med Center area. Houston would be my first thought as we are closer to downtown Houston. But you define Houston as IAH which generally gets vastly different weather from us. Hobby is next closest but selecting that isn’t intuitive for our more centrally located Houston area. Something like a color coded map we could look at a glance would be so helpful to many. Just my 2 cents. Thanks again SCW team!

  104. As another poster has stated, it would be a nice feature if the app would show the rain percentage. Just showing a symbol of a rainy day could mean 30% or 80%.

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