The best Android weather app you should be using isn't on the Play Store

At first, I never understood my colleagues’ obsession with weather apps. After all, I had simply relied on Google’s weather notifications for years. That’s until I actually tried a few of the weather apps my colleagues here at Android Authority suggested.

That’s when I realized what I’d been missing. My forecasts didn’t have to be limited to daily highs and lows, with often inaccurate predictions. Instead, I could have tailored insights that provided the data I was most interested in. I, too, became a weather app nerd.

And yet, one of the apps that offers the best experience — Breezy Weather — doesn’t get the attention it deserves because it’s not on the Play Store.

Breezy’s customization is its strength

While many apps offer some level of customization, Breezy really encapsulates the concept. Rather than a one-size-fits-all approach, it lets you choose the data that’s most important to you. You can choose which blocks you want on the app’s main screen, including Precipitation nowcasting, Daily forecast, Hourly forecast, Precipitation, Wind, Air quality, Pollen, Humidity, UV index, Visibility, Pressure, Sun, and Moon.

Even when you have all these items selected, as I do, the app presents the data in a user-friendly way so that you don’t feel overwhelmed with cluttered information. While I’ve stuck with the default icon pack for Breezy, you can also download additional icon packs to change the appearance slightly. These packs include a Pixel icon pack and a One UI icon pack, so the app fits your phone’s OS.

Regarding notifications, you’re not left to the app’s automatic updates. Rather, you can choose when you want to receive notifications for forecasts, or if you want to receive these notifications at all.

The app also includes widgets you can add to your phone’s home screen. For example, I have enabled its Clock + Daily widget, replacing my OS’s equivalent offering. Even the widget can be customized, including its background color, opacity, text color, text size, and font.

After years of feeling like my weather apps didn’t give me the information I needed, or accurate enough information, my experience with Breezy has been great. I can even select the data source, which helps when I feel like forecasts and current condition reports aren’t quite reflecting what’s happening on a day-to-day basis.

Breezy keeps my forecast free of ads and bloat

While multiple data categories are a good thing, providing users with irrelevant ones creates a bloated experience. That’s why Breezy’s ability to customize what you see is so important. This makes it stand out from apps like Samsung Weather. I enjoy Samsung Weather’s ability to easily display a multi-day forecast, but I find myself scrolling past irrelevant cards to reach the data I need.

For example, Samsung Weather includes a card that tells you whether the conditions are suitable for different types of activities (mostly sports). Since I don’t play sports, this card isn’t relevant for me. But I can’t remove it from my weather app’s home screen. At the bottom of the app, there is also a videos section, which just feels like a way to drive engagement with content rather than a useful tool suitable for a weather app.

While Samsung’s app doesn’t serve me ads, it’s a different story with the weather app on my HONOR smartphone. Recently, I started noticing ads between the data cards in the app. This feels incredibly intrusive, since this isn’t a third-party app where I’d expect this sort of thing. Speaking of third-party apps, advertising is so prevalent that I’m often hesitant to try out apps I stumble across on the Play Store.

But with Breezy, I don’t get ads, and I can control what I see. This means that the app’s home screen can be as minimalist or comprehensive as I want it to be. This makes it worth side-loading the app from GitHub or F-Droid. Breezy also doesn’t skimp on detail. If you want to see detailed forecasts and information about what each metric means, you simply have to click on an item to see more.

There is one thing I wish Breezy did better

Breezy lets you enable weather alerts, but I’ve found they are a bit broad and general. You can enable notifications for severe weather and rain, but that’s about it. This differs from an app like Gradient Weather, which offers a range of alerts — including frost, UV index, pollen, rain, weather warnings, pressure warnings, and air quality. I particularly like that you can customize these alerts and set thresholds for particular notifications.

The drawback of Gradient Weather’s alerts is that free accounts only get two alerts, and not all alerts work in all regions. For example, pollen data is not available in my location. Weather warnings are also only available in particular regions.

I wish these types of customizable alerts were available in Breezy Weather, as they would add to the app’s great versatility. For example, I’d love to flag significant changes in atmospheric pressure to see if they contribute to my migraine attacks. It would also be great to set alerts for temperature thresholds, since I know that sudden changes in temperature and hot weather can trigger my migraines.

Right now, I create temperature alerts using Samsung Modes and Routines and Home Assistant. But I can’t use air quality data or atmospheric pressure as variables in my Samsung routines, and setting up Home Assistant automations can involve a lot of troubleshooting.

Although I wish Breezy had custom alerts, its lack of these notifications isn’t enough to get me to stop using the app. It excels in other areas, including the ability to switch forecast providers to the most accurate option for your region, its excellent customization, and its rich features. If you haven’t given Breezy Weather a shot and are looking for a new go-to weather app, I can’t recommend it enough.