Daily sunshine hours observed on 29th May 1964 at 03xxx stations (337 reports).
Date (00Z D to 24Z D)
-1 day
+1 day
Plot hours Plot % of theoretical max
UK only UK & ROI
Highest 10
Bridlington (48 m, CS)14.7 hours
Scarborough, Town Hall (36 m, CS)14.6 hours
Fettercairn, Glensaugh No 2 (171 m, CS)14.2 hours
Sourhope (221 m, CS)13.9 hours
Silpho Moor (203 m, CS)13.8 hours
Cromer (37 m, CS)13.6 hours
High Mowthorpe (175 m, CS)13.5 hours
Skegness (6 m, CS)13.5 hours
Gorleston (4 m, CS)13.5 hours
Burlingham (27 m, CS)13.4 hours

Lowest 10
Aber (18 m, CS)0.0 hours
Valley (10 m, CS)0.0 hours
Fyvie Castle (55 m, CS)0.0 hours
Wick Airport (36 m, CS)0.0 hours
Kirkwall (26 m, CS)0.0 hours
Costa (35 m, CS)0.0 hours
Edinburgh, Royal Botanic Garden No 2 (28 m, CS)0.1 hours
Crumbland Plantation (245 m, CS)0.3 hours
Cwmystwyth (301 m, CS)0.3 hours
St Andrews (18 m, CS)0.4 hours

Average Sun = 6.5 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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