During the announcement of its new Pixel Tablet, Google revealed
another major development – the tech giant’s own weather forecast platform. This
is big news for Pixel users considering that until now, they could only obtain
weather updates from a simple widget on Pixel phones, displayed in a basic format.
Pixel Weather doesn’t exist in the Pixel tablet as a
separate app but is integrated in the main Google app. Designed with enhanced visuals
and information, it looks advanced and is not only optimized for small screens
but makes use of the big screen just as well. A dark mode can be activated too,
which tones down and inverses most colours without affecting the graphics.
In addition to displaying 10-day and 24-hour forecasts, Pixel Weather shows stats for wind, humidity, barometric pressure, UV index reports, current sun position, highs and lows, ‘feels like’ temperatures, as well as sunrise and sunset times. There are also details for precipitation, wind, and humidity for each hour of the day when you tap on a day in the 10-day forecast. In other words, Pixel Weather is just as efficient as the Apple and Samsung weather apps.
Pixel Weather also shows information on precipitation when
relevant, up to 12 hours in advance. It does so in an elaborate manner, by providing
immediate forecasts in terms of how intense precipitation will be and how long
it will last, using data from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric
Administration and other authentic sources.
Pixel Weather will initially work on the Pixel Tablet and the upcoming Pixel Fold, and Google plans to make it available on other devices in the future, which it has not revealed a specific timing for as of yet.
