Weather and Climate: What's the Difference?

Weather and Climate relate to each other, but they are not the same. In short, weather events like rain and snow are highly unpredictable by nature, whereas climate is the overall, long term analysis of weather events.

Weather is highly unpredictable. Think of winter snow terms, flooding spring showers, rumbling summer storms and hurricanes as summer transitions into autumn. The further away from the present moment, the less reliable the local weather guy's forecasts will be. Next time you check the "weather report," take note of the present conditions, hourly predictions, the 2-day outlook, and the exclusive 7-day forecast or however long the app predicts. Next, as those days pass, keep track of how much the forecast changes during that same predicted period of time. You'll notice that even with today's technology, weather events remain largely unpredictable by nature.

Aftermath of an unpredictable "pop up" storm cell (Philadelphia area, 23 June 2015)

On the other hand, climate is highly analytical and looks at the overall weather conditions like temperature and precipitation in a particular place over a particular period of time. The amount of time could be as small as one day in a certain season, or up to even thousands or millions of years. Technology for climate scientists, or climatologists, continues to improve, so relatively accurate observances of changes in climate overtime and their effects can be calculated and presented as in the image below.

At the surface for years 1961-1990.
Image Credit: Robert A Rhohde of the Global Warming Art Project.