Daily sunshine hours observed on 21st April 2001 at 03xxx stations (210 reports).
Date (00Z D to 24Z D)
-1 day
+1 day
Plot hours Plot % of theoretical max
UK only UK & ROI
Highest 10
Southend, Southchurch Park (4 m, CS)12.0 hours
Preston Wynne (84 m, DRV)11.8 hours
Lowestoft (25 m, CS)11.7 hours
Hunstanton No 2 (15 m, CS)10.9 hours
Torquay, Abbey Park (15 m, CS)10.9 hours
Bristol Weather Centre (42 m, CS)10.1 hours
Cromer (37 m, CS)10.0 hours
Isle Of Portland (52 m, CS)10.0 hours
Cardiff Weather Centre (52 m, CS)9.9 hours
Bramham (54 m, DRV)9.8 hours

Lowest 10
Colonsay: Homefield (9 m, CS)0.0 hours
Strabane, Carricklee (39 m, CS)0.0 hours
Glasgow, Bishopton (59 m, WMO)0.0 hours
Tiree (9 m, CS)0.0 hours
Halkirk, Dale Farm (64 m, CS)0.0 hours
Berriedale, Badrinsary (160 m, CS)0.0 hours
Mucker Broughderg (190 m, CS)0.0 hours
Corgary (145 m, CS)0.0 hours
Barons Court (132 m, CS)0.0 hours
Armagh (62 m, CS)0.0 hours

Average Sun = 4.7 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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