Apple Weather forecasts suffer rare outage

Posted:
in General Discussion edited April 2023
Users of Apple's Weather app around the world have periodically been getting blank screens as no data is available.




It appears to have been a worldwide issue, though not necessarily for all users in all regions. Currently most weather data is back, although at times the chosen city has to be reloaded before forecasts appear correctly.

Apple's official system status site acknowledges that there is an issue. However, it claims that the impact is now solely affecting users in Alaska.

Apple claims the issue is solely affecting Alaska, but it's been seen across the world
Apple claims the issue is solely affecting Alaska, but it's been seen across the world


It's unlikely that Apple gets all of its weather data from a single data provider in Alaska. So presumably the system status reflects only the current issue, and that it has been improving overnight.

That appears to reflect how certain regions are now getting forecasts, at least if the Weather app is forced to reload a city's data. However, if it's correct that it's a data outage, it would suggest that there have been multiple such outages at data providers around the world.

According to Apple, the issues began at 11 p.m. Eastern on Monday.

Apple's Weather app was redesigned following the company's acquisition of Dark Sky. It has separately been criticized for an inconsistent "bug" to do with its temperature data display.

Update at 4 p.m. Tuesday: Apple stated it resolved the issue with the Weather service at around 1:31 p.m. Some users still report issues as the fix rolls out globally.

Update at 4:45 p.m. Tuesday: Apple has issued a new issue on its System Status page at 3:54 p.m., indicating that the service may be slow or unavailable.

Read on AppleInsider

Comments

  • Reply 1 of 10
    This is a problem that has been recurring for quite a while. It is one of the reasons that I went back to AccuWeather. There were many instances of that "No Weather Data" appearing in the widget on my phone. As we head into spring here in the midwest, it's important to be alerted to bad weather, like we had last week, and you can't afford to rely on an app that periodically tells me that it has no data. Honestly, I keep trying to use Apple's native apps, but they just seem to be a low priority to the company.
    bloggerblogwilliamlondon
  • Reply 2 of 10
    rob53rob53 Posts: 3,254member
    Doesn't really matter in the Pacific Northwest. We were supposed to have two sunny days, yet I woke up to rain this morning. No app can forecast the weather, they depend on the weather forecasting people/system they get the feed from. I doubt the app is the problem in this case, I've heard the PNW has limitations on the number and accuracy of reliable weather radar and forecasting systems. 
    watto_cobra
  • Reply 3 of 10
    It is still not working in the mid south area today. 
    williamlondon
  • Reply 4 of 10
    my hometown hasn’t been showing up consistently for months, my wife has the same issue
    williamlondon
  • Reply 5 of 10
    mylovinomylovino Posts: 22member
    Still a problem here in Germany, just had it an hour ago on my iPhone with latest iOS version, so just not true what Apple is stating…or they just referred to the US
    williamlondon
  • Reply 6 of 10
    robin huberrobin huber Posts: 3,965member
    No problem, switched to Carrot Weather’s Dark Sky look-alike after Apple bought it and trashed its best feature—its look. 
    williamlondon
  • Reply 7 of 10
    xyzzy-xxxxyzzy-xxx Posts: 185member
    Same problem here in Germany – the widget is permanently empty and the weather app mostly...
    williamlondon
  • Reply 8 of 10
    dutchlorddutchlord Posts: 216member
    Same problems in The Netherlands. Blank screen.
    williamlondon
  • Reply 9 of 10
    And what about weather radar? The transition between past and future is often comical, with incredible predicted changes in direction. 
    edited April 2023
  • Reply 10 of 10
    netroxnetrox Posts: 1,423member
    This is a problem that has been recurring for quite a while. It is one of the reasons that I went back to AccuWeather. There were many instances of that "No Weather Data" appearing in the widget on my phone. As we head into spring here in the midwest, it's important to be alerted to bad weather, like we had last week, and you can't afford to rely on an app that periodically tells me that it has no data. Honestly, I keep trying to use Apple's native apps, but they just seem to be a low priority to the company.
    Did you have the location services disabled for weather widget? I had that problem only to found out it was because of location services being disabled because how does it know where you are when it attempts to load the local weather. It should display "location service disabled" though instead of showing blank data. 
    watto_cobra
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