WeatherPro HD for Tablet

Summary

Weather frogs, ground hogs—they’re nice, some might even argue there’s something endearing – albeit not exactly scientifically accurate – about a small animal predicting the weather, but let’s face it, it does strike as somewhat old fashioned. And I don’t know about you, but I hardly ever watch telly anymore, so televised weather forecasts have more or less become obsolete in my world. As an alternative, I’ve been using the Android application WeatherPro for some time now. WeatherPro HD is the version optimized for tablets of said app. If you’ve read Yan's review of WeatherPro you will know that IMO it is the ultimate weather forecast application—so how does the tablet version fare? Find out more about our App of the Week in today’s review!

Test device: Samsung Galaxy Tab 10.1
Android version: 3.1

15,48 MB is sizeable, but bear in mind that the largest private European weather service MeteoGroup's application does harbour a good amount of features.

There’s enough information here to keep track of the weather over a week in advance, and it gets updated every 3(!) seconds. Weather forecasts are provided for over two million locations worldwide. It also provides details regarding daily sunshine duration, windchill factor and UV index. Sunrise and set are also indicated.
Animated radar and satellite images display visuals for most of Europe and the USA; European visuals are updated every 15 minutes, the rest of the world every three hours.

The app can be accessed via shortcut or three sizes of widgets (2x1, 4x1 and 4x2). Oh, and WeatherPro HD is available in 12 languages, it is App2SD compatible and comes with live wallpapers that adapt to the current weather situation. Unfortunately, images are not displayed fully in landscape mode.
 

If you’ve read my lovely colleague Yan’s review of WeatherPro you will know that quite a few members of the AndroidPIT crew have been very satisfied with the app—which is why this section is especially relevant in terms of this review, seeing as this is where it becomes apparent whether the app has been well optimised for tablet use. And it has: there’s a great overview and using the app is a real treat.

WeatherPro HD immediately susses out the user’s location (no need to enter a location manually). A classic weather tab is displayed containing an overview displaying a 7-day weather forecast (date, time) as well as visuals for upcoming meteorological developments such as highest and lowest temperatures, wind speed, chance and amount of precipitation (in percent/millimeters), air pressure (Hektopaskal), sunshine duration (in minutes) and humidity (in percent).

If you want to look up the weather in other locations use the search button (upper right corner), and save your favourite locations for quick and easy future access.

A thermometer displays current updates for the parameters listed above. The display works well in portrait and landscape mode.

Tabs for all the most important functions (weather, radar satellite, settings) allow fast access to the app’s features. The radar and satellite visuals are great.
Hit settings to look up news or information related to the application or change weather units. The following options are available:

• Temperature: °C and °F
• Wind: km/h, kn, ms, Bft, mph
• Air pressure: hPa, inHg, Torr
• Precipitation: in, mm

I would love to see an option to change the widget’s colour like with WeatherPro.

Bottom line:
If your are looking for in-depth weather related updates and information for tablet use look no further: WeatherPro HD is the app for you. Controls are very easy and the app is well designed. Aside from great aesthetics this app is also – and most importantly – very accurate when it comes to current and upcoming weather forecasts. Whilst predicting the weather is never 100% accurate, this app will definitely help you decide whether or not to grab an umbrella before leaving the house, or donning that giant fur coat you inherited from your great-aunt.

 

It’s very smooth sailing indeed with WeatherPro HD. The tablet version runs just as fluidly as the smartphone one, including the permanent weather updates.

The version for smartphones is available for 2,99 EUR; WeatherPro HD on the other hand costs 3,99 EUR. Quite a price tag for an app that has ‘only’ been optimised for tablet use. That said, the app is well worth it for tablet owners who wish to be well informed about the weather, seeing as once you’ve installed WeatherPro HD on your device my guess is that you won’t be changing to any other service any time soon.