Today, we encounter weather information on platforms like television channels, websites offering content, and many apps. These platforms increase the user experience by providing relevant weather information to their users. The most popular way these platforms obtain weather data today is through a weather data API.
The weather data API has been developed to provide users with almost any weather-related data they need. One of these needs is historical weather data. Today, the use and popularity of historical weather data have increased. In this article, we will first talk about the importance of historical weather data. Next, we’ll get to know the most popular weather API available on the market and test its historical weather data endpoint.
Table of Contents
What Is the Significance of the Historical Weather Data?
Historical weather data is actively used in many projects and businesses today. With these data, services are provided to users in many fields today. The main importance of historical weather data is that it allows forecasting of future weather conditions. Many businesses use historical weather data for this purpose.
For example, historical weather data is essential in the agricultural sector. With these data, agricultural workers can analyze harvest times.
Another example is using these data in the aviation and tourism sectors. Aviation and tourism industries make flight or tour plans using this data for the future.
In addition, these data are used by many artificial intelligence applications today. With weather APIs that provide this data with high accuracy, many artificial intelligence projects offer services that can directly help human life.
The weatherstack API: Current and Historical Weather Data Provider
The weatherstack API is a top-rated web service that provides weather data. It is used by nearly 75,000 businesses, including large companies such as Microsoft, Deloitte, and Warner Bros.
This API provides weather data for millions of locations around the world. It has an extensive data set, and the accuracy of the data it provides is high. For this, it obtains the data it provides from powerful data sources.
This API serves its users with multiple endpoints. Some of these services provide current, historical, and weather forecast data. In addition, it provides these services in just seconds and gives users a speedy experience.
The weatherstack API is a very easy-to-use API. Also, it is easily integrated into all programming languages. The powerful documentation of this API includes sample integration codes for many popular programming languages such as PHP, JavaScript, Python, and Go.
Using the weatherstack Historical Weather API With Different Programming Languages
In this step, we will see the integration codes of different programming languages of the weatherstack’s endpoint, which provides historical weather data.
For the integration codes to work, we will first sign up for one of the affordable subscription plans provided by the weatherstack. After choosing one of these subscription plans and registering, we will obtain an API key.
Now we can list the integration codes of the weatherstack API for different programming languages.
PHP:
$location = 'New York';
$queryString = http_build_query([
'access_key' => 'YOUR_ACCESS_KEY',
'query' => $location,
'historical_date' => '2015-01-21',
'hourly' => '1'
]);
$ch = curl_init(sprintf('%s?%s', 'https://api.weatherstack.com/historical', $queryString));
curl_setopt($ch, CURLOPT_RETURNTRANSFER, true);
$json = curl_exec($ch);
curl_close($ch);
$response = json_decode($json, true);
echo $response;Python:
# coding: utf-8
import requests
params = {
'access_key': 'YOUR_ACCESS_KEY',
'query': 'New York',
'historical_date' => '2015-01-21',
'hourly' => '1'
}
api_result = requests.get('https://api.weatherstack.com/historical', params)
response = api_result.json()
print(response)Node.js:
const axios = require('axios');
const params = {
access_key: 'YOUR_ACCESS_KEY',
query: 'New York',
historical_date => '2015-01-21',
hourly => '1'
}
axios.get('https://api.weatherstack.com/historical', {params})
.then(response => {
const response = response.data;
console.log(response);
}).catch(error => {
console.log(error);
});Conclusion
In summary, weather data is frequently encountered on almost every platform. For example, many e-commerce sites offer products related to weather conditions in their customers’ locations. These platforms prefer weather APIs that serve in more than one area, such as historical weather data, the most popular service in recent times.
Use the best weather API in the market, and get historical and current weather data with high accuracy.
FAQs
Q: What Data Does the weatherstack API Provide Regarding Weather Conditions?
A: The weatherstack API offers its users very rich weather fields. Wind direction, wind speed, average temperature, pressure, UV index, and more. This API also provides information such as latitude, longitude, and region of the weather-queried location.
Q: What Is the Most Popular Free Weather Data API List in the Market?
A: There are many weather data APIs in the market today. The free ones that developers and businesses can use from these APIs are as follows:
- The weatherstack API
- Tomorrow.io
- OpenWeatherMap API
- Ambee API
- AccuWeather API
Q: Does a Historical Weather Data API Use Weather Stations Data?
A: Yes, it usually is. A weather data API can use weather station data to provide its users with a comprehensive data on historical weather conditions.
Q: Is the weatherstack API a Free Weather API?
A: Yes, it is. The weatherstack API offers users current and historical data with many different subscription plans. The first of these plans is the free plan. The free plan requires an API key to use, and the free plan is limited to 250 requests per month.