Apple to shut down Dark Sky app; publishes a guide to Weather app for Dark Sky users

You may have heard that recently Apple announced it will be shutting down the weather app Dark Sky that it acquired in 2020. The date the app will be shut down is January 1, 2023, so basically in just a couple of weeks. And now Apple has published a document that should help Dark Sky fans switch to Apple Weather. And, as 9to5Mac reports, some users are not really happy.

Apple publishes support document to help Dark Sky users switch to Apple Weather

There’s now a new support document that Apple published which gives some tips for Dark Sky users when switching to Weather. Cupertino underlines that Dark Sky’s features have been integrated into the native Weather app. The Weather app offers hyperlocal forecasts for your current location, next-hour precipitation, hourly forecasts for the next 10 days, high-resolution radar, and notifications. The support document also gives a guide to Dark Sky users on how to navigate Apple Weather and how to find the features they need. We’ll dive into these a bit later.

Dark Sky features in Apple Weather detailed by Apple

Apple states that you can get down-to-the-minute precipitation forecasts for your location with Apple Weather. You can also get an hourly forecast for the next 10 days with the app.
Additionally, Apple Weather can display full-screen high-resolution weather maps. This can help you see how currents are moving for your location and actually the entire world. These maps include information on precipitation, air quality, and temperature. Next-hour precipitation and air quality are limited to certain countries and regions, so do keep that in mind.

Apple also underlines that the weather forecasts on the Apple Weather app are hyperlocal. This means these are down to 0.001° of latitude and longitude for a specific place. It basically creates a forecast for not only your town or city but your block. And, according to Apple, you get down-to-the-minute notifications of when precipitation will start.

And last but not least, you can also get severe weather notifications from the Weather app. These are government-issued warnings about the weather in your region, so you can know if there are going to be strong wind gusts, thunderstorms, or anything of that kind.

Some Dark Sky users are not happy with the app’s shutdown

Many users have taken to Reddit, as the folks over at 9to5Mac point out, to express their opinion about the shutting down of Dark Sky. Some users state that the Apple Weather radar is not on par with Dark Sky’s. Other users shared that the Dark Sky interface was easier or more convenient for them to use, and Apple Weather has many drop-down menus for features that were more easily reachable on Dark Sky.

And others point out that the most important thing is correct prediction and real-time forecasts. However, some users do point out that for certain locations, Apple Weather has proven more accurate than Dark Sky.

All in all, the shutdown of Dark Sky is indeed (and for many people, disappointingly) something that’s inevitably happening, so many Dark Sky fans are going to have to look for alternatives.

Apple acquired the Dark Sky app in 2020, and since then, Cupertino has integrated many of its features into its own Weather app. The app also was recently made available on iPad with iPadOS 16 (yep, before that iPad models didn’t come with a Weather app… wonder when we’ll get a calculator on iPad, but that’s another story for another time…).

All in all, the Weather app could be a really good alternative for Dark Sky, if you’ve found it reliable in your country or region. Other alternatives are also available, for example, AccuWeather, which is an app that usually holds top places in App Stores thanks to reliability, customization, and real-time alerts.