Are weather and climate the same thing? No, here’s the difference

Weather, as in a weather forecast, refers to short-term conditions in the atmosphere in a particular location or region.

Climate, on the other hand, describes the average daily weather for extended periods, such as if winters are cold and snowy or if summers are hot and humid, according to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.

Basically, climate is the average weather pattern in an area over a longer period of time, and weather patterns, according to NOAA, are caused by the flow in atmosphere.

"Weather is the mix of events that happen each day in our atmosphere," NOAA reported. Although there is just one atmosphere on Earth, the weather is different around the world and changes over minutes, hours, days and weeks. A given area may experience a warm winter, or maybe a wet month or even a rainy decade, but those variance are still weather-related.

So, one of the main differences between weather and climate is time, with weather referring to a short span of time and climate referring to longer-range weather patterns in a region, generally over 30 years or more.

Credit: NOAA

Credit: NOAA

"While weather can change dramatically in a single location from day to day (for example, cold and rainy one day, followed by hot, dry conditions the next day), climate generally changes less quickly because it represents the average of weather conditions over a longer period of time," according to the American Geosciences Institute.

There are generally five types of climate, including dry, temperate, tropical, continental and polar. It’s hotter near the equator, for example, so locations closest to the equator have a more tropical climate, while areas closest to the Arctic and Antarctic have a polar climate.

Credit: NOAA

Credit: NOAA

When it comes to weather, National Geographic reports, there are six main components: temperature, wind, humidity, atmospheric pressure, precipitation and cloud cover. Weather can includes all kinds of conditions, such as sunshine, rain, hail, snow, flooding, blizzards, thunderstorms, heat waves and more.

The difference between weather and climate can be summed up this way, according to NOAA: Climate is what you expect. Weather is what actually happens.