The truth is, Android never had the kind of weather app that users wanted to check first. For Google, that’s especially galling because, as a global search giant, its weather app should be the only one you turn to for accurate, aggregated data. The situation became desperate in 2020 when Apple bought Dark Sky and put it behind its walled, fenced garden. Now, iPhone users have what was once Android’s most popular weather app, and a native app with a cult following.
For Android users who are yearning for something better, there’s good news. Code sleuths at 9to5Google and Android Authority are raving about a completely revamped Weather app coming soon to the Pixel experience. In a leaked APK that you can download yourself (keeping in mind that this is a pre-release version and everything is at your discretion), we get a glimpse of all the new things that will be coming to Google’s default Weather app.
The Pixel Weather app will get its long-overdue material makeover. The various information panels will be modeled after the Pixel’s latest widgets. There are more rounded corners, bolder icons, data that’s easier to grasp, and the sunrise and sunset widget makes a bit more visual sense than it used to.
Unfortunately, Froggy didn’t make it into this version. The Google weatherman appeared in several Google Doodles during the ecosystem’s lifetime and now seems to have been officially retired. Perhaps it was time for Froggy to find a lily pad where he isn’t the hero of a weather app that Android users choose second. I’d be willing to retire too if I had to deal with that kind of rejection for years.
Google’s Pixel Weather app will adopt your device’s color scheme, whether dark or light. It will also ask for notification permissions to periodically push a forecast for your current location. It seems similar to what you see on the home screen right now with the Pixel Launcher’s At a Glance widget. There are also reports on X/Twitter/Whatever of a weather map, which seems to be helpful for a place like the San Francisco Bay Area, where there are microclimates and you can’t leave the house without being prepared for the weather an hour later. However, I couldn’t find any such feature with the APK installed on my Pixel 8.
We’ll soon find out what’s special about the revamped weather app, and there may be some AI improvements that haven’t been revealed yet. Google’s Made by Google event is on August 13, and that’s when we expect to hear all about what’s new on the Pixel 9 and the rest of the hardware family.
There are still plenty of third-party weather apps out there. Weather Live is the app I use for its hourly forecasts and wind directions, as it used to be free with Google’s Play Pass. But if Google’s forecasts are accurate enough, I’ll probably trade that app for a native app.
