We Tested the Best Home Weather Stations—These Are Our Favorites for Monitoring the Weather (2024)

The WeatherFlow Tempest is an all-in-one weather system with accurate sensors that send data fast, but it’s also easy to install and use. We think this weather station is a good option for weather enthusiasts who want to pour through tons of data, while still being easy enough for beginners. We’ve tested it twice, and both times it created added interest, spurring others to buy their own unit after seeing how easy it is to set up and use.

We love how the Tempest packs a number of advanced sensors into a compact package that’s so easy to install. It uses haptics to measure rainfall instead of a tipping bucket system, and an ultrasonic sensor to measure wind direction and speed instead of cups and an anemometer, so there aren’t any moving parts to wear out or snap off.

The sensors are very accurate, which weather enthusiasts will appreciate. We did notice some wind readings that seemed off, but that could have been due to positioning. Rain start and stop times were true to observations, and rainfall was also similar to measurements taken with a rain gauge.

This weather station doesn’t have a dedicated display, which is the one real weak point. It would be nice to have all that data front and center on a dedicated screen like the Ambient Weather WS-5000 (our best splurge pick), but the app does a great job of showing the most important information and letting you drill down into historic data. We really enjoyed watching the real-time data stream through the app during storms, including the notifications of lightning strikes.

Another thing we love about this weather station is that you can share the data with friends and family. In addition to displaying info in the app, you can also access it through a website, which you can share with anyone you want. You can also send data to Weather Underground.

This weather station is compatible with both Alexa and Google Home, which allows you to check the weather with voice commands and also set up routines that trigger based on specific weather conditions, like preventing your smart sprinkler system from watering when rain is on the horizon.

That’s the major selling point of this weather station—accurate, hyper-local forecasts. WeatherFlow uses machine learning to analyze your weather data, along with data from other nearby weather stations, to create a personalized forecast for your area. We found it to be just as accurate, if not moreso, than commercially available forecasts like Accuweather’s Minutecast, and it’s available right in the WeatherFlow app for no extra cost.

The AcuRite 01121M is a basic weather station that measures temperature, humidity, and barometric pressure (indoors and outdoors), with a clean vertical display and basic forecasting capabilities. It’s a good option if you just want to know the local conditions without a lot of extraneous information.

Our favorite thing about this weather station is the display, which we set up on a shelf using the included stand. With a dark background and colorful numbers, we found it easy to read in all lighting conditions (including full daylight and late at night with all the lights off.) The display and sensor are also very small and portable, to the point where you could easily pack them along on a camping trip to keep track of the local weather conditions.

This weather station doesn’t have any advanced sensors or connectivity features (there’s no app and you can’t send weather data to the internet), but it’s priced accordingly. It’s the lowest cost option we recommend, at about $30 less than the La Crosse Weather Station (our best for beginners pick), which has the same basic sensors as this weather station.

The AcuRite Iris is a 5-in-1 weather station that also includes a separate lightning sensor, which is why it’s a good option if you’re specifically looking to monitor lightning and rain. The included display is a basic monochrome LCD model with colorful stickers, but it features a prominent lightning detection alert that you just can’t miss.

We liked how easy this weather station was to set up, since there’s just one outdoor sensor unit for everything but the lightning detector. It also received points for how solid the connection was between the sensors and the indoor receiver. Once we set it up, the base station and sensor units never lost contact, even in extreme weather.

During testing, the lightning detector was accurate and helpful, as it would sound an alarm and show the distance of the lightening strike. That’s important information to have, and we were able to adjust our schedule to avoid heading out for a walk with lightning striking nearby. We also thought it was interesting to see how many times lightning struck after the storm passed.

We also thought the rain gauge was very accurate, comparing it to nearby Weather Underground readings and a garden rain gauge. We liked that we didn’t have to empty it, and that we were able to see both the current rain and historic data without needing to go outside and write down measurements every day.

The only thing we didn’t like about this weather station was the display, which is very basic, difficult to navigate, and didn’t support sending data to an app or the Weather Underground. It shows all the most important information right up front, but accessing historic data and other information was cumbersome. AcuRite sells a version that comes with a better display and Wi-Fi connectivity, but the price is about $60 higher.

The Ambient Weather WS-5000 is a full-featured weather station complete with the best display we’ve ever tested. The instruments are extremely accurate, and you can add all sorts of additional sensors, so we recommend it to weather enthusiasts and hobbyists who are ready to invest in a serious weather station that goes far beyond basic all-in-ones.

This weather station comes with an ultrasonic wind sensor, rain cup, and temperature sensor that can be mounted independently or together. That’s different from most weather stations, and it’s one of the reasons we specifically recommend the WS-5000 to weather enthusiasts. Each of these sensors has its own ideal mounting location (high up for wind, down lower for temperature and humidity, and outside any rain shadows for the rain cup), which isn’t an option with all-in-one weather stations.

Most weather stations come with a basic monochrome LCD display (or no display at all), which is why the WS-5000 display stands out so much. It’s a full color TFT (thin film transistor) LCD display that shows a ton of information. The text is a bit small, and there’s a lot of information to parse, but we were able to read it without too much trouble. It shows the current temperature and humidity, wind speed and direction, heat index, current and historic rainfall, and even includes a forecast icon that shows which direction the weather is headed.

This weather station includes Wi-Fi connectivity, which we used to send data to the Ambient Weather phone app. It also has the ability to send data to Weather Underground and other services, but we found the Ambient Weather app to be user-friendly and easy to navigate, with tiles for each weather sensor, and graphs to show historical data. If you add additional sensors to the WS-5000, they show up in the app and not the main display (the exception is that if you add a lightning sensor, the display will show that.)

Our favorite feature of this weather station is the rain gauge, which was accurate. It was also fun to see the current rainfall rate (during one storm the rate came very close to 1 inch per hour). We also like that we can use the map feature to check other stations to see the rainfall in different areas and how it compared to what we were actually seeing.

The Ecowitt Wittboy is a good choice if you want a weather station that does it all, but you don’t want to broadcast that you have a weather station to the whole neighborhood. This compact device uses advanced haptic and ultrasonic sensors, so there aren’t any moving parts to break down over time. We like how easy it was to install, because everything is contained in one unit—just point it north, secure it in place, and it’s ready to go.

This weather station doesn’t have a dedicated display, but it does have a base station that connects to the internet, and apps for both your computer and your phone. Getting it connected was quick and easy, and we were able to view live weather data on our computer and phone, along with graphs and charts. We ended up not really missing the monitor because we could view our weather data on a smartphone from anywhere.

During testing, we were especially impressed with the accuracy of the temperature and rain readings. The wind seemed off, but that could have been due to where it was mounted. We mounted it up high above our chimney, but local weather stations typically take their readings higher up than that (30+ feet)

We think this is a good lower-cost alternative to other haptic and ultrasonic weather stations we recommend, like the WeatherFlow Tempest (our best overall recommendation) and the Ambient Weather WS5000 (our best splurge pick). It does most of the things those systems do, but it doesn’t have lightning detection, and it doesn’t provide customized forecasts. If you don’t need those, then this device is a solid alternative.

The Eve Weather Connected Weather Station is the perfect addition to your Apple-powered smart home, with seamless HomeKit integration and Thread compatibility that allows it to join your network automatically. It’s a fairly basic weather station with the same instruments (temperature, humidity, and pressure) as the La Crosse Technology Weather Station (our best for beginners pick), but designed with connectivity in mind.

This weather station doesn’t have a dedicated display, but it does show the temperature and humidity right on the device itself. It also integrates with the iOS Home app and Eve’s own app. We liked that it works with Home, but we were able to access a lot more data (like historic temperature and humidity readings) through the Eve app. The Eve app is also capable of providing access to other connected smart devices, and we found that we liked it more than Apple Home.

The sensor doesn’t provide specific forecasts, but the Eve app uses temperature and barometric pressure readings to determine how the weather is trending, with a sunshine, partly cloudy, and cloudy icons that seemed to line up well with the actual state of the weather. Temperature readings were accurate, but we wished that it could track more data, like wind direction and speed.

We like how well this weather station integrated into our smart home through HomeKit. We had a little trouble figuring it out at first, but we were eventually able to set up an automation that turned a smart light on when the temperature reached a specific level. That isn’t necessarily a very useful automation, but the possibilities are endless. For example, you could use one of these sensors to trigger a heat lamp or fan in a greenhouse, or a heater in a shed or trailer.

If you’ve never used a home weather station before and just want to be able to check the local temperature and humidity before heading out the door, this La Crosse Technology weather station is a good fit. We like how easy it was to set up and found the large display to be very easy to read at a glance.

This is a basic weather station, but it provided us with accurate readings. The outdoor sensor unit measures temperature and humidity, as does the indoor unit, so the display shows you readings for both inside and outside. We also like how clear the display was, and that the backlight was bright enough to read in any conditions.

The display is well-organized, with indoor readings on one side and outdoor readings on the other. It also shows temperature trends for both inside and outside, and has a small forecast window that gives you an idea of what the local weather conditions will be in the future. The timeline isn’t exactly clear, but the images give you a good idea of whether to expect sun, clouds, rain, thunderstorms, or snow. Consulting with the manual reveals that the forecast reflects how the weather is likely to change within the next 12 hours, but the display itself doesn’t make that clear.

This isn’t the weather station to choose if you want information about wind speed or lightning strikes, or if you want to access your weather data through an app. Instead, it’s a great option for beginners and anyone who wants to check the temperature and humidity on the way out the door, with a fairly accurate picture of how the weather may change within the next 12 hours.

The Logia 5-in-1 Wi-Fi Weather Station is the best choice if you want a full suite of weather sensors with the option to upload data to the internet, and your target expense is right at or around $100. The integrated sensor body measures all the most important weather data, and sends it to a basic indoor display unit that makes it easy to see everything at a glance. It doesn’t have a dedicated app, but you can send your data to Weather Underground or Weathercloud and view it that way.

We like how easy this weather station was to set up, as all the sensors are built into a single assembly, and it came with all the hardware we needed to attach it to a decorative fence in an area with no wind or rain obstructions. The indoor display unit was also easy to set up, too—connecting it to the sensor unit and our Wi-Fi network only took a few minutes. However, connecting to Weather Underground was a different matter.

Since this weather station doesn’t have a dedicated app, we wanted to connect to Weather Underground to be able to access our weather data through the Weather Underground app. The instructions for how to do so were very unclear, and it took us more than half an hour to figure it out and set everything up.

Once we had the Logia connected, we were immediately able to view real time data through the Weather Underground app. It would have been nice to have a dedicated app, but the Weather Underground app showed all the information we needed, and it was easy to navigate.

We didn’t completely replace our daily ritual of checking the Weather Channel, but we found the customized Weather Underground forecasts to be very accurate overall. We also liked that we could check historical data from the Logia, like the temperature and rainfall from the previous day.

But that happens to also be the catch, because the basic Netatmo Weather Station doesn’t measure a whole lot. We tested a setup with the wind sensor add-on, but you can also add a rain gauge and additional indoor sensors to monitor the air quality throughout your home.

The basic Netatmo Weather Station comes with two sensor modules, one for inside and the other for outside, that measure temperature, humidity, and pressure. The indoor sensor also measures air quality (including CO2) and noise levels.

We were impressed with how easy it is to add additional modules to the Netatmo Weather Station. When we added a wind sensor, all we had to do was insert the batteries and hold it next to the indoor unit, and it synchronized automatically. The sensors provided accurate readings, and we liked that the indoor sensors included a CO2 monitor.

There’s no dedicated display, but we were able to access all of the data through the Netatmo app without any issues. The app is intuitive and easy to navigate, and provides some useful graphs and other information. We were also able to connect it to the iOS Home app, but the Netatmo app provides such great visuals that we used that more. We wish the graphs had the option to slide or zoom (especially the predictions), so hopefully that’s something Netatmo addresses in a software update some day.

_{Display Type: | Sensors: Temperature, humidity, pressure, CO2, sound, wind direction, wind speed, indoor temperature, indoor humidity | Transmission Interval: 5 minutes | Transmission Range: Not provided | Connectivity: HomeKit, Alexa, Google Home | App: Yes}

The Sainlogic Wireless Weather Station is the best choice if you want an indoor display that’s clear and easy to read, and you don’t care about a mobile app or uploading weather data to the internet. This weather station includes all the most important weather monitoring instruments in a single sensor body that’s easy to set up and install, and all that data is displayed on a well-organized color LCD display.

The display is our favorite thing about this weather station. We found it a little difficult to navigate, and had to rely on the manual to make any adjustments, but all the most important data is shown in an easy to digest format, including data from all the sensors, a clock, and even the current moon phase. We especially appreciated the accurate wind gust measurements, since we had it installed at the top of a breezy ridge and it was very helpful to know how fast the wind was gusting before stepping outside.

In addition to showing all the most important weather data, the display unit also allows you to set up alarms based on 27 different data points. We had to rely on the manual because the controls never felt intuitive, but we found that we could set an alarm to alert us to wind gusts over a specified threshold, high heat index, and a huge number of other options.

This weather station doesn’t include an app or any kind of connectivity, but it’s a good price for a comprehensive sensor suite—about half the price of the Weatherflow Tempest (our best overall recommendation)—so it’s a great deal if you aren’t looking for connectivity.

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