Atmosphere

Atmospheric variables include temperature, precipitation, wind, pressure, clouds, greenhouse gases, and much more. Overview pages summarize and compare selected datasets of a given variable.

To find a specific dataset or variable, jump to the search box below or click your desired variable from among the blue sub-category buttons. Note that the classification of datasets by variable is approximate, especially for large, multi-variable datasets like reanalyses.

To see only the datasets accompanied by in-depth commentary, select the "Datasets with guidance" button when using the search box.

Climate datasets

Has expert guidance
timeseries of signal and noise in the SOI Southern Oscillation Indices: Signal, Noise and Tahiti/Darwin SLP (SOI)

  • Years of record

  • to

The Southern Oscillation Index (SOI) is a time series used to characterize the large scale sea level pressure (SLP) patterns in the tropical Pacific. Monthly…

Main variables and Earth System components

Atmosphere Sea Level Pressure
NAO DJFM Station-based Index Hurrell North Atlantic Oscillation (NAO) Index (station-based)

  • Years of record

  • to

The winter (December thru March) station-based index of the NAO is based on the difference of normalized sea level pressure (SLP) between Lisbon, Portugal and…

Main variables and Earth System components

Atmosphere Sea Level Pressure
Standardized Precipitation Index (SPI) Standardized Precipitation Index (SPI)

  • Years of record

  • to

The Standardized Precipitation Index (SPI) is a widely used index to characterize meteorological drought on a range of timescales. On short timescales, the SPI…

Main variables and Earth System components

Atmosphere Precipitation Land Drought

    • Formats

    • N/A

    • Timestep

    • Monthly

    • Domain

    • N/A

    • Collections

    • N/A
GPCP (Monthly): Global Precipitation Climatology Project GPCP (Monthly): Global Precipitation Climatology Project

  • Years of record

  • to

Data from rain gauge stations, satellites, and sounding observations have been merged to estimate monthly rainfall on a 2.5-degree global grid from 1979 to the…

Main variables and Earth System components

Atmosphere Precipitation
NAM spatial pattern Hurrell wintertime SLP-based Northern Annular Mode (NAM) Index

  • Years of record

  • to

The NAM (or Arctic Oscillation) is defined as the first EOF of NH (20°-90°N) winter SLP data. It explains 23% of the extended winter mean (December-March)…

Main variables and Earth System components

Atmosphere Sea Level Pressure
Overview: Carbon Dioxide (CO2) Data Sets Overview: Carbon Dioxide (CO2) Data Sets

  • Years of record

  • to

Directly measured and continuous records of atmospheric carbon dioxide (CO2) extend back to 1958. CO2 has also been measured in ancient air samples trapped in…

Main variables and Earth System components

Atmosphere CO2 Biosphere

  • Experts contributing reviews

  • N/A
North Pacific (NP) Index by Trenberth and Hurrell; monthly and winter North Pacific (NP) Index by Trenberth and Hurrell; monthly and winter

  • Years of record

  • to

The North Pacific Index (NP index or NPI) is the area-weighted sea level pressure over the region 30°N-65°N, 160°E-140°W. The NP index is defined to measure…

Main variables and Earth System components

Atmosphere Sea Level Pressure
GPCC: Global Precipitation Climatology Centre GPCC: Global Precipitation Climatology Centre

  • Years of record

  • to

The GPCC provides gridded gauge-analysis products derived from quality controlled station data. Two products are for climate: (a) the Full Data Reanalysis…

Main variables and Earth System components

Atmosphere Precipitation

  • Experts contributing reviews

  • N/A
TRMM: Tropical Rainfall Measuring Mission TRMM: Tropical Rainfall Measuring Mission

  • Years of record

  • to

The Tropical Rainfall Measuring Mission (TRMM) is a joint space mission between NASA and Japan's National Space Development Agency designed to monitor and study…

Main variables and Earth System components

Atmosphere Precipitation
CMAP: CPC Merged Analysis of Precipitation CMAP: CPC Merged Analysis of Precipitation

  • Years of record

  • to

CMAP refers to a collection of precipitation data sets, though the 2.5°x2.5° global monthly version is probably the most widely used. This data set is…

Main variables and Earth System components

Atmosphere Precipitation
U.S. Climate Extremes Index (CEI) U.S. Climate Extremes Index (CEI)

  • Years of record

  • to

The U.S. Climate Extremes Index (CEI) was first presented in 1995 as a framework for quantifying observed changes in climate within the contiguous United States…

Main variables and Earth System components

Atmosphere Air Temperature Maximum Air Temperature Minimum Air Temperature Precipitation Wind Land Drought
COSP: Cloud Feedback Model Intercomparison Project (CFMIP) Observation Simulator Package COSP: Cloud Feedback Model Intercomparison Project (CFMIP) Observation Simulator Package

  • Years of record

  • N/A

Cloud processes and feedbacks are recognized as the largest uncertainty in climate model projections of climate change. Progress in understanding the roles of…

Main variables and Earth System components

Atmosphere Cloud Properties
Global (land) precipitation and temperature: Willmott & Matsuura, University of Delaware Global (land) precipitation and temperature: Willmott & Matsuura, University of Delaware

  • Years of record

  • to

A series of gridded temperature and precipitation data sets. Station records that served as bases for the Terrestrial Air Temperature: 1900-2014 Gridded Monthly…

Main variables and Earth System components

Atmosphere Air Temperature Air Temperature at 2m Precipitation
Extended Edited Synoptic Cloud Reports Archive (EECRA) from Ships and Land Stations Over the Globe Extended Edited Synoptic Cloud Reports Archive (EECRA) from Ships and Land Stations Over the Globe

  • Years of record

  • to

"The Extended Edited Synoptic Cloud Reports Archive makes use of routine synoptic observations made by humans on ships over the ocean and at weather stations…

Main variables and Earth System components

Atmosphere Cloud Properties

    • Timestep

    • Sub-daily

    • Collections

    • N/A
Gridded Climatology of Clouds from Surface Observations Worldwide (1971-2008) Gridded Climatology of Clouds from Surface Observations Worldwide (1971-2008)

  • Years of record

  • to

This digital archive provides multi-year monthly, seasonal, and annual averages in 5x5-degree grid boxes (or 10x10-degree boxes for some quantities over the…

Main variables and Earth System components

Atmosphere Cloud Properties
COREv2 Air-Sea Surface Fluxes COREv2 Air-Sea Surface Fluxes

  • Years of record

  • to

The Coordinated Ocean Research Experiments version 2  (COREv2) data set consists of a globally complete set of air-sea fluxes of momentum, heat and freshwater…

Main variables and Earth System components

Atmosphere Evaporation Precipitation Radiation Wind Stress Land Runoff and Streamflow Ocean Surface Flux
Hurrell North Atlantic Oscillation (NAO) Index (PC-based) Hurrell North Atlantic Oscillation (NAO) Index (PC-based)

  • Years of record

  • to

The principal component (PC)-based indices of the North Atlantic Oscillation (NAO) are the time series of the leading Empirical Orthogonal Function (EOF) of SLP…

Main variables and Earth System components

Atmosphere Sea Level Pressure
HOAPS: Hamburg Ocean Atmosphere Parameters and Fluxes from Satellite Data HOAPS: Hamburg Ocean Atmosphere Parameters and Fluxes from Satellite Data

  • Years of record

  • to

The Hamburg Ocean Atmosphere Parameters and Fluxes from Satellite Data (HOAPS) set is a satellite-based climatology of precipitation, evaporation and freshwater…

Main variables and Earth System components

Atmosphere Evaporation Evaporation-Precipitation Precipitation Radiation Specific Humidity Wind Latent & sensible heat flux Precipitable water Ocean SST - sea surface temperature

  • Experts contributing reviews

  • N/A
IBTrACS: Tropical cyclone best track data IBTrACS: Tropical cyclone best track data

  • Years of record

  • N/A

IBTrACS (International Best Track Archive for Climate Stewardship) provides global tropical cyclone best track data in a centralized location to aid our…

Main variables and Earth System components

Atmosphere Storm data
MSU/AMSU Atmospheric Temperature Climate Data Record, Remote Sensing Systems (RSS) MSU/AMSU Atmospheric Temperature Climate Data Record, Remote Sensing Systems (RSS)

  • Years of record

  • to

A long (30-year+) data set of atmospheric temperatures for 4 tropopsheric and lower stratopsheric layers has been derived from brightness temperatures measured…

Main variables and Earth System components

Atmosphere Air Temperature
Budgets: Mass, Moisture, Energy Budgets: Mass, Moisture, Energy

  • Years of record

  • N/A

The uneven distribution of incoming and outgoing radiation is the primary driver of the climate system. The resulting flows of energy by the climate components (…

Main variables and Earth System components

Atmosphere Budget Evaporation Evaporation-Precipitation Radiation

  • Experts contributing reviews

  • N/A
ERA-Interim: derived components ERA-Interim: derived components

  • Years of record

  • to

Era-Interim data are used to derive monthly mass, moisture and energy budget products. Each term is available. Atmospheric energy, mass, and moisture budgets can…

Main variables and Earth System components

Atmosphere Budget Evaporation-Precipitation

  • Experts contributing reviews

  • N/A
) Example of CloudSat and CALIPSO cloud mask along a single orbit. (contributed by Will Bertrand) Combined CloudSat spaceborne radar and CALIPSO spaceborne lidar cloud fraction dataset (3S-GEOPROF-COMB)

  • Years of record

  • to

A global (82S-82N) cloud fraction data set, providing a unique view of cloud vertical structure, has been developed based on the complimentary spaceborne remote…

Main variables and Earth System components

Atmosphere Cloud Properties
NOAA ThreadEx Long-term Station Extremes for America NOAA ThreadEx Long-term Station Extremes for America

  • Years of record

  • to

ThreadEx is a data set of extreme daily temperature and precipitation values for 270 locations in the United States. For each day of the year at each station,…

Main variables and Earth System components

Atmosphere Air Temperature Maximum Air Temperature Minimum Air Temperature Precipitation

  • Experts contributing reviews

  • N/A
QBO: Quasi-Biennial Oscillation QBO: Quasi-Biennial Oscillation

  • Years of record

  • to

The quasi-biennial oscillation (QBO) is a quasi-periodic oscillation of the equatorial zonal wind between easterlies and westerlies in the tropical stratosphere…

Main variables and Earth System components

Atmosphere Wind

    • Timestep

    • Monthly

    • Collections

    • N/A

  • Experts contributing reviews

  • N/A
WASWind: Wave and Anemometer-based Sea Surface Wind WASWind: Wave and Anemometer-based Sea Surface Wind

  • Years of record

  • to

"WASWind (Wave and Anemometer-based Sea Surface Wind) provides a bias-corrected marine surface wind dataset over the global oceans. Variables include scalar,…

Main variables and Earth System components

Atmosphere Wind Wind Stress

    • Timestep

    • Monthly

    • Collections

    • N/A
PRISM High-Resolution Spatial Climate Data for the United States: Max/min temp, dewpoint, precipitation PRISM High-Resolution Spatial Climate Data for the United States: Max/min temp, dewpoint, precipitation

  • Years of record

  • to

PRISM is a set of monthly, yearly, and single-event gridded data products of mean temperature and precipitation, max/min temperatures, and dewpoints, primarily…

Main variables and Earth System components

Atmosphere Dew Point Temperature Maximum Air Temperature Minimum Air Temperature Precipitation
GPCP (Daily): Global Precipitation Climatology Project GPCP (Daily): Global Precipitation Climatology Project

  • Years of record

  • to

The 1DD product provides precipitation estimates on a 1-degree grid over the entire globe at 1-day (daily) for the period October 1996 - present. Both the Pentad…

Main variables and Earth System components

Atmosphere Precipitation
CMORPH (CPC MORPHing technique): High resolution precipitation (60S-60N) CMORPH (CPC MORPHing technique): High resolution precipitation (60S-60N)

  • Years of record

  • to

"CMORPH (CPC MORPHing technique) produces global precipitation analyses at very high spatial and temporal resolution. This technique uses precipitation estimates…

Main variables and Earth System components

Atmosphere Precipitation

  • Experts contributing reviews

  • N/A
PERSIANN-CDR: Precipitation Estimation from Remotely Sensed Information using Artificial Neural Networks - Climate Data Record PERSIANN-CDR: Precipitation Estimation from Remotely Sensed Information using Artificial Neural Networks - Climate Data Record

  • Years of record

  • to

The Precipitation Estimation from Remotely Sensed Information using Artificial Neural Networks- Climate Data Record (PERSIANN-CDR) provides daily rainfall…

Main variables and Earth System components

Atmosphere Precipitation
CPC Unified Gauge-Based Analysis of Global Daily Precipitation CPC Unified Gauge-Based Analysis of Global Daily Precipitation

  • Years of record

  • to

A gauge-based analysis of daily precipitation has been constructed over the global land areas. Gauge reports from over 30,000 stations are collected from…

Main variables and Earth System components

Atmosphere Precipitation

    • Timestep

    • Daily

    • Collections

    • N/A

  • Experts contributing reviews

  • N/A
Japanese Ocean Flux Data sets with Use of Remote Sensing Observations (J-OFURO2) Japanese Ocean Flux Data sets with Use of Remote Sensing Observations (J-OFURO2)

  • Years of record

  • to

These ocean surface flux data sets are derived primarily using data from multiple satellites. The COARE 3.0 bulk algorithm [Fairall et al. (2003)] is used in J-…

Main variables and Earth System components

Atmosphere Specific Humidity Wind Stress Latent & sensible heat flux Ocean Surface Flux

  • Experts contributing reviews

  • N/A
OAFlux: Objectively Analyzed air-sea Fluxes for the global oceans. OAFlux: Objectively Analyzed air-sea Fluxes for the global oceans.

  • Years of record

  • to

"The OAFlux project aims to provide consistent, multi-decade, global analysis of air-sea heat, freshwater (evaporation), and momentum fluxes for use in studies…

Main variables and Earth System components

Atmosphere Latent & sensible heat flux Radiation Wind Ocean SST - sea surface temperature Surface Flux wind stress curl

    • Timestep

    • Daily, Monthly

    • Collections

    • N/A

  • Experts contributing reviews

  • N/A
map of Tmin over eastern US (credit: Michelle Thornton) Daymet: Daily Surface Weather and Climatological Summaries

  • Years of record

  • to

Daymet provides long-term, continuous, gridded estimates of daily weather and climatology variables by interpolating and extrapolating ground-based observations…

Main variables and Earth System components

Atmosphere Maximum Air Temperature Minimum Air Temperature Precipitation Radiation Water Vapor Cryosphere Snow Water Equivalent
CloudSat CloudSat

  • Years of record

  • to

CloudSat is a satellite mission designed to measure the vertical structure of clouds from space. The radar data produces detailed images of cloud structures.…

Main variables and Earth System components

Atmosphere Cloud Properties

    • Timestep

    • Monthly

    • Collections

    • N/A

  • Experts contributing reviews

  • N/A
CALIPSO CALIPSO

  • Years of record

  • to

CALIPSO (Cloud-Aerosol Lidar and Infrared Pathfinder Satellite Observations ) was launched on April 28, 2006 to study the impact of clouds and aerosols on the…

Main variables and Earth System components

Atmosphere Aerosols Cloud Properties

    • Timestep

    • Sub-daily, Daily

    • Collections

    • N/A

  • Experts contributing reviews

  • N/A
AIRS and AMSU: Tropospheric air temperature and specific humidity AIRS and AMSU: Tropospheric air temperature and specific humidity

  • Years of record

  • to

The Atmospheric Infrared Sounder (AIRS) project has generated decadal-length, global, gridded data sets of temperature and specific humidity for several standard…

Main variables and Earth System components

Atmosphere Air Temperature Specific Humidity
Cloud observations from MODIS Cloud observations from MODIS

  • Years of record

  • to

The Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) is scanning instrument that makes measurements in 36 spectral bands from the visible to the thermal…

Main variables and Earth System components

Atmosphere Cloud Properties
Stratospheric Ozone: Randel & Wu 2007 Stratospheric Ozone: Randel & Wu 2007

  • Years of record

  • to

This is a monthly, zonal-mean ozone profile data set spanning 1979–2005 for altitudes from the tropopause up to 50 km. Interannual variability is based on a…

Main variables and Earth System components

Atmosphere Ozone: Stratospheric
Stratospheric & Tropospheric Ozone: ACC/SPARC (Atmospheric Chemistry and Climate / Stratospheric Processes and their Role in Climate) Stratospheric & Tropospheric Ozone: ACC/SPARC (Atmospheric Chemistry and Climate / Stratospheric Processes and their Role in Climate)

  • Years of record

  • to

"The AC&C/SPARC ozone database covers the period 1850 to 2100 and can be used as forcing in climate models that do not include interactive chemistry. The…

Main variables and Earth System components

Atmosphere Ozone: Stratospheric

  • Experts contributing reviews

  • N/A
Stratospheric Ozone: Vertically Resolved, zonal mean based on BDBP Stratospheric Ozone: Vertically Resolved, zonal mean based on BDBP

  • Years of record

  • to

Combined monthly mean vertical ozone profile database spanning the period 1979 to 2007. The database is completely filled such that there are no missing data.…

Main variables and Earth System components

Atmosphere Ozone: Stratospheric

    • Timestep

    • Monthly

    • Collections

    • N/A
Total Column Ozone: Bodeker Scientific Total Column Ozone: Bodeker Scientific

  • Years of record

  • N/A

Bodeker Scientific produces global, daily, total column ozone database by combining measurements from a number of different satellite-based instruments. Offsets…

Main variables and Earth System components

Atmosphere Ozone: Total Column Ozone: Stratospheric

  • Experts contributing reviews

  • N/A
HadGHCNDEX - Gridded Daily Temperature Extremes HadGHCNDEX - Gridded Daily Temperature Extremes

  • Years of record

  • to

HadGHCND (aka HadGHCNDEX) is a gridded daily dataset of near-surface maximum (TX) and minimum (TN) temperature observations. Anomalies (departures from 1961-1990…

Main variables and Earth System components

Atmosphere Maximum Air Temperature Minimum Air Temperature

  • Experts contributing reviews

  • N/A
QuikSCAT: near sea-surface wind speed and direction QuikSCAT: near sea-surface wind speed and direction

  • Years of record

  • to

The QuikSCAT mission was intended to obtain sea-surface wind speed and direction data under all weather and cloud conditions over Earth's oceans. SeaWinds, an…

Main variables and Earth System components

Atmosphere Wind
AIRS (Atmospheric InfraRed Sounder): Version 6 Level 2 AIRS (Atmospheric InfraRed Sounder): Version 6 Level 2

  • Years of record

  • to

AIRS Version 6 Level 2 data represent a significant improvement over AIRS Version 5 Level 2 products in terms of greater stability, yield, and quality. Several…

Main variables and Earth System components

Atmosphere Aerosols Air Temperature CO Geopotential Height Ozone: Tropospheric Precipitable water Specific Humidity

  • Experts contributing reviews

  • N/A
APHRODITE: Asian Precipitation - Highly-Resolved Observational Data Integration Towards Evaluation of Water Resources APHRODITE: Asian Precipitation - Highly-Resolved Observational Data Integration Towards Evaluation of Water Resources

  • Years of record

  • to

APHRODITE’s (Asian Precipitation - Highly-Resolved Observational Data Integration Towards Evaluation) gridded precipitation is a set of long-term (1951 onward)…

Main variables and Earth System components

Atmosphere Air Temperature Precipitation
NLDAS-2 Primary Forcing monthly average 2-m surface temperature for July 1980. NLDAS: North American Land Data Assimilation System

  • Years of record

  • to

The North American Land Data Assimilation System (NLDAS) integrates a large quantity of observation-based and model reanalysis data to produce long-term hourly…

Main variables and Earth System components

Atmosphere Air Temperature CAPE Evaporation Precipitation Radiation Specific Humidity Surface Pressure Wind
AIRS and AMSU: Trace Gases (CO2, CO, CH4, O3...); Level 3 AIRS and AMSU: Trace Gases (CO2, CO, CH4, O3...); Level 3

  • Years of record

  • N/A

AIRS provides satellite retrieval of mid-tropospheric carbon dioxide even under cloudy conditions, without the use of a priori information from models. AIRS…

Main variables and Earth System components

Atmosphere CO Ozone: Tropospheric Biosphere CH4-Methane CO CO2

  • Experts contributing reviews

  • N/A
Tropical Moored Buoy System: TAO, TRITON, PIRATA, RAMA (TOGA) Tropical Moored Buoy System: TAO, TRITON, PIRATA, RAMA (TOGA)

  • Years of record

  • to

The Tropical Ocean Global Atmosphere program (TOGA) is a component of the World Climate Research Programme (WCRP) aimed specifically at the prediction of climate…

Main variables and Earth System components

Atmosphere Air Temperature Precipitation Radiation Relative Humidity Sea Level Pressure Wind Ocean Absolute Dynamic Topography (ADT) Ocean Heat Content SST - sea surface temperature Salinity Sub Surface Salinity Sub Surface Temperature u, v current components

    • Timestep

    • Sub-daily, Daily, Monthly, Weekly

    • Collections

    • N/A

  • Experts contributing reviews

  • N/A
CLARA-A1: Cloud properties, surface albedo and surface radiation products based on AVHRR CLARA-A1: Cloud properties, surface albedo and surface radiation products based on AVHRR

  • Years of record

  • to

"CLARA-A1 (CLoud, Albedo and RAdiation dataset, AVHRR-based, version 1) is a global dataset of cloud properties, surface albedo and surface radiation products,…

Main variables and Earth System components

Atmosphere Cloud Properties Liquid Water Path Radiation Surface albedo