Snow on the Ground Right Now
The gauge above shows how much snow is lying on the ground at your location, measured against a graduated post just as a real snow stake would be read in the field. As the page finds your position — or you search a city — it pulls the live snow depth and builds the snowpack up the scale to the correct height in centimetres. When it is actively snowing, flakes drift down through the scene, and the readouts below fill in the depth in centimetres and inches, the recent snowfall, the air temperature and the snow's water content. If you are somewhere warm and green, try searching a mountain resort or a northern city to watch the gauge fill.
Snow is unusual among weather measurements because it accumulates: rain falls and drains away, but snow stays, building a record of winter on the ground that can last for months.
What a Snow Gauge Measures
"Snow gauge" covers a small family of instruments, because snow is measured in more than one way. The simplest is a snow stake or snow ruler — a graduated post fixed in an open, representative spot, read by eye to give the depth of snow on the ground. For new snow, observers use a snow board: a flat white panel laid on the existing surface, on which fresh snowfall is measured and then swept clean for the next reading. And to capture the water in the snow, a weighing or melting gauge collects snow and measures how much liquid it becomes. Modern automated stations replace the human eye with ultrasonic or laser sensors that read the distance down to the snow surface many times an hour.
Snow Depth vs Snowfall
These two numbers are often confused, but they answer different questions. Snowfall is the amount of new snow that fell in a period — say, 20 cm overnight. Snow depth is the total depth of snow on the ground at this moment. They are not simply additive: snow settles and compacts under its own weight, melts from below against warm ground, and is packed down by sun and wind, so a season that saw a metre of cumulative snowfall might show only 40 cm of depth at any one time. Both matter — snowfall for judging today's travel and avalanche risk, depth for the state of the snowpack as a whole.
Reading the Graduated Scale
The post on this gauge is marked in centimetres, the standard unit for snow across most of the world; the readout also gives the depth in inches for regions that use them. Reading real snow depth in the field carries a subtlety the gauge hints at: snow drifts. Wind piles it deep in some places and scours others bare, so a single stake can mislead. Official observers choose a sheltered, level, representative site — or average several measurements — to get a depth that reflects the true snow cover rather than a chance drift or a wind-swept patch.
The Water Inside the Snow
Snow is mostly air, and how much water it holds varies enormously. The rough rule of thumb is that 10 centimetres of snow melts to about 1 centimetre of water — a 10-to-1 ratio — but cold, dry powder can be 15 or even 20 to 1, while wet, heavy snow near the freezing point can be as low as 5 to 1. This "snow water equivalent" is one of the most important quantities in hydrology: the mountain snowpack is a natural reservoir, and the water locked inside it determines spring river flows, reservoir levels and flood risk when it melts. The gauge shows an approximate water equivalent alongside the depth.
Powder, Wet Snow and Why It Matters
The character of snow depends on the temperature at which it forms. In very cold air, snow crystals stay dry and feathery, producing the light powder that skiers prize and that piles up quickly but compacts easily. Near freezing, the flakes are wetter and stickier, packing into dense, heavy snow that is exhausting to shovel, clings to trees and power lines, and can bring them down. The air temperature shown on the gauge is a clue to which kind is falling — and to whether snow lying on the ground is likely to be firming up, thawing, or holding.
Why Measuring Snow Matters
Snow measurement is quietly one of the most consequential jobs in weather observation. Highway and railway authorities depend on snowfall totals to schedule ploughing and gritting and to decide closures. Avalanche forecasters watch new snow loading on the existing pack to issue warnings that save lives. Water managers track the mountain snowpack all winter because it feeds rivers and reservoirs through the following summer. Farmers, foresters, ski resorts and event organisers all plan around it. Behind every "record snowfall" headline is a simple gauge, read carefully.
Snow Around the World and Its Words
Snow depth is measured wherever winter reaches, and the vocabulary follows: snow is neige in French, Schnee in German, nieve in Spanish, neve in Italian and Portuguese, and снег in Russian. Snowfall and snow depth are distinguished in every language that deals with serious winters, because the difference between what fell and what remains is exactly what determines whether the roads are passable and the rivers will run in spring.
From Snow Stake to Satellite
For most of history, snow was measured by a person with a ruler, walking to a marked stake each morning — and in many places it still is, because the method is simple and reliable. But snow is now also tracked by automated mountain stations that weigh the snowpack on pressure pillows, by ultrasonic sensors that ping the surface from above, and by satellites that map snow cover across whole continents. This page draws on modern gridded weather data to estimate the snow on the ground at your chosen point — the digital continuation of a very old, very practical measurement.