Daily sunshine hours observed on 9th July 1952 at 03xxx stations (93 reports).
Date (00Z D to 24Z D)
-1 day
+1 day
Plot hours Plot % of theoretical max
UK only UK & ROI
Highest 10
Folkestone (39 m, CS)12.5 hours
Margate (16 m, CS)11.9 hours
Shoeburyness (2 m, CS)11.8 hours
Scarborough, Town Hall (36 m, CS)11.7 hours
Colwyn Bay (36 m, CS)11.6 hours
Colwyn Bay, Council Offices (25 m, CS)11.6 hours
Durham (102 m, CS)10.6 hours
Morpeth, Cockle Park (95 m, CS)10.4 hours
Swanage (10 m, CS)10.4 hours
Waddington (68 m, CS)10.2 hours

Lowest 10
Onich (15 m, CS)0.0 hours
Benmore, Forestry School (14 m, CS)0.1 hours
Fort Augustus (21 m, CS)0.1 hours
Auchincruive (48 m, CS)0.2 hours
Tenby, Priory (20 m, CS)0.4 hours
Haverfordwest (41 m, CS)0.4 hours
Stornoway Airport (15 m, CS)0.6 hours
Falmouth (51 m, CS)0.7 hours
Rochdale (110 m, CS)0.9 hours
Paisley (32 m, CS)0.9 hours

Average Sun = 5.3 hours

*MIDAS UK data available from 1887
*SYNOP data available from 2000
*Background satellite imagery from 25/02/2000

Data courtesy of MetOffice and OGIMET
OpenMIDAS Data - Met Office (2021): MIDAS Open: UK daily temperature data, v202107. NERC EDS Centre for Environmental Data Analysis, 08 September 2021.


Methods for measuring sunshine have changed over time, older records and some climate sites today will use a Campbell-Stokes sunshine recorder, whereas nowadays the majority of measurements will be taken using a pyrheliometer and threshold of 120 W/m^2 for sunshine. The instrumentation used is indicated by the letters in the table - WMO means a pyrheliometer was used, CS means a Campbell-Stokes recorder was used, and S means that the value was extracted from the SYNOP report (most likely to be a pyrheliometer measurement but not for certain). Clicking on an icon in the map will display a popup which also contains this information.

It is possible to convert the newer pyrheliometer measurements to a Campbell-Stokes equivalent for a fairer comparison across time, which is done for climatological purposes, and is a function which I may add to this page at some point.



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