About PlainClimate

Our Mission

PlainClimate exists because families, retirees, and remote workers researching where to live deserve easy access to reliable climate data, without paywalls, paid rankings, or algorithms that tell you what city is "best" based on opaque criteria.

We believe the best climate is the one that fits your personal needs, and the only way to find it is with honest data. NOAA publishes comprehensive climate normals for thousands of U.S. locations, but the data is buried in bulk download files and scientific station-level formats that require expertise to navigate. PlainClimate transforms this data into clear, searchable city and state profiles that anyone can use.

We do not rank cities by "best climate" - we present the data and let you decide. Climate preferences are personal. Someone with arthritis needs different conditions than someone who loves skiing. A retiree seeking mild winters has different priorities than a family that wants four seasons. Our role is to make the data accessible, not to make the decision for you.

Our Data Sources

National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA)

All climate data on PlainClimate comes from the NOAA U.S. Climate Normals, 1991-2020, published by the National Centers for Environmental Information (NCEI). Climate normals are 30-year averages of temperature, precipitation, snowfall, humidity, wind speed, and other weather variables, calculated according to World Meteorological Organization (WMO) standards.

The dataset covers 15,492 weather stations across the United States, including airport weather stations (USW prefix), cooperative observer stations (USC), community collaborative rain and hail networks (US1), and snow telemetry stations (USS). We aggregate station data to the location level, covering 6,861 station-mapped locations across all 50 states. An exact normalized name-and-state crosswalk against the U.S. Census Bureau's 2024 Gazetteer places file classifies 3,347 as incorporated places, 570 as Census-designated places, and 2 as other Census place types. It leaves 18 ambiguous because more than one Census place has the same normalized name and state, and 2,924 unresolved because no exact match exists. Because the corpus mixes municipalities, statistical places, airports, facilities, and other station names, we describe it as station-mapped locations rather than cities. The classification and source provenance are persisted on every row and re-created by the ETL; the audit is independently re-runnable with scripts/etl/audit-place-identity.mjs. Conservative matching means the unresolved figure is an upper bound on facilities, not a claim that every unresolved row is a facility.

NOAA climate normals are the gold standard for U.S. climate data. They are used by the National Weather Service, the Department of Energy, agriculture planners, and urban development agencies. The source data is publicly available at NOAA NCEI Climate Normals.

How We Process the Data

We download NOAA's published climate normal files and process them through the following steps:

• Station parsing: We parse fixed-width and CSV station data files for each climate variable (temperature, precipitation, snowfall, humidity, wind). Each station's metadata, coordinates, elevation, station type, is extracted and validated.
• City aggregation: Station data is mapped to the nearest city using geographic coordinates. When multiple stations serve a single city (common in large metro areas), we use the station with the most complete data record, prioritizing airport stations (USW) for consistency.
• Monthly and annual calculation: We present monthly normals (January through December) and annual averages for each variable. Derived metrics like annual heating and cooling degree days are computed from the temperature normals.
• State summaries: State-level statistics are computed from the underlying city data, providing statewide ranges and averages for each climate variable.

PlainClimate does not estimate, interpolate, or alter the NOAA values it receives. Where a station or variable is absent from our dataset, we show "Data not available" rather than a portal-generated estimate. NOAA documents its own quality-control and normals-calculation methods, including how it handles incomplete station records; all figures here are those official NOAA values presented in more accessible formats.

Data Currency

PlainClimate currently displays the NOAA 1991-2020 U.S. Climate Normals, released in 2021. Climate normals are recalculated by NOAA every 10 years, and the current dataset will remain the official standard until the next update, expected to cover the 2001-2030 period, likely published around 2031.

Because climate normals are 30-year averages, they do not change between update cycles. The data on PlainClimate will remain stable until NOAA publishes new normals. However, actual recent weather may deviate from these normals due to climate trends, our climate change guide explains this distinction in detail.

Editorial Independence and Methodology

Raw climate-normals data from NOAA, USGS, EPA, and related environmental agencies is loaded directly from the agency files and transformed into readable city and state profiles by our publishing pipeline, then validated against the source before publication. PlainClimate is responsible for editorial standards, methodology, and corrections. Numbers, tables, and visualizations are derived from the upstream source, we do not alter underlying figures, only the language used to describe them.

Nobody buys their way onto this site. No city, tourism board, relocation service, utility, or agency pays to be listed, to be described a particular way, or to sit higher in a ranking, and none of them sees a page before it is published. PlainClimate is funded by contextual display advertising served by Google AdSense. Advertisers see the same NOAA normals every reader sees, have no say in which stations or cities we publish, and buy no position in any comparison or ranking on this site.

Limitations and Disclaimers

PlainClimate is an informational resource. Climate data should be one factor among many in relocation, travel, and planning decisions.

• Normals are averages, not predictions: Climate normals describe the typical climate of the recent past. Individual years can and do deviate significantly. A city with an average annual rainfall of 40 inches may experience 25 inches or 55 inches in any given year.
• Station representativeness: Weather station data represents the station's location, which may differ from other parts of the city, especially in areas with significant elevation or terrain variation. Airport stations (the most common type) may not reflect conditions in nearby urban or suburban areas.
• Climate change: The 1991-2020 normals capture conditions of the recent past. Current and future conditions in many locations are trending warmer than these averages, particularly in the western U.S. and Alaska.
• Not a weather forecast: Climate normals are not weather forecasts. They cannot tell you what conditions to expect on a specific future date. Always consult the National Weather Service for forecasts and weather safety information.

PlainClimate is not affiliated with NOAA or the U.S. government. We are an independent data portal providing public information in an accessible format.

Open Data

When reusing the table, name PlainClimate as the compiler of the station-mapped NOAA 1991–2020 normals extract. Download plainclimate-city-normals.csv (CC0 / public domain). Primary source: NOAA U.S. Climate Normals.

Contact

Questions, data corrections, or feedback? Email us at hello@plainclimate.com.

We welcome:

• Questions about data sources or methodology
• Reports of apparent data errors or anomalies
• Suggestions for additional data or features
• Media and research inquiries

PlainClimate is a data intelligence company that builds free, public-interest data portals from authoritative government datasets.