Which soaring forecast covers your region
There is no central index of soaring weather products, which is why pilots mostly use whatever the person who taught them used. Here is what exists, what each one actually models, and what it costs — checked on 06 September 2026.
Before you subscribe to anything
Learn to read the morning sounding for your area first. It is free, it is measured rather than modelled, and it is what every one of the paid products is trying to predict. A pilot who can read a sounding gets more out of a cheap forecast than one who cannot gets out of an expensive one.
Then ask your club what they use. Local knowledge about which product is reliable at your site is worth more than any comparison table, including this one.
SkySight
Commercial subscription
- Coverage
- Most of Europe, the United States, Canada, Australia, New Zealand, Japan, Argentina and Brazil.
- Model
- In-house high-resolution WRF-based model, published at 100 m resolution, out to six days.
- Shows
- Thermal strength and height, wind, storms, wave and convergence.
Good for: The most widely used paid service among US and Australian cross-country pilots. Strong on wave and convergence, which most general-aviation products do not model at all.
Watch for: A single model. When it is wrong for your site it is wrong all day, so it pays to know how it behaves locally before trusting it on a big task.
TopMeteo
Commercial subscription
- Coverage
- Europe, Africa and the USA. The cheaper packages cover one country; the Premium package covers all regions.
- Model
- Four forecast days on the lower tiers, up to six on Premium.
- Shows
- Thermal maps, potential flight distance, cloud distribution, significant weather, winds aloft, plus satellite and rain radar.
Good for: The longest-running international soaring forecast, and the strongest European coverage. Potential-flight-distance maps are genuinely useful for deciding whether a day is worth travelling for.
Watch for: The country-limited tiers are a real constraint if you fly competitions or expeditions outside your home country.
XC Skies
Commercial subscription
- Coverage
- Global, with high-resolution models for North America, Europe, the Alps, France and Spain.
- Model
- Nine selectable models rather than one: GFS (24 km), ICON (13 km), ICON-EU (6.5 km), ICON-D2 (2.2 km, Alps), RAP (13 km), NAM (12 km), NAM Hi-Res (3 km), HRRR (3 km) and AROME (2.5 km, France).
- Shows
- Interactive soaring maps, temperature and dew point profiles, lift potential, cloud and thunderstorm risk.
Good for: Being able to compare several models on the same day is its real advantage — when they agree you can plan with confidence, and when they disagree that is itself the forecast.
Watch for: More configuration than the others. Rewards a pilot who wants to understand the models; more than a beginner needs.
RASP (regional instances)
Free, volunteer-run
- Coverage
- Region by region. Individual volunteers run WRF over their own local domain, so coverage is patchy and entirely dependent on somebody nearby maintaining an instance.
- Model
- WRF, using the BLIPMAP parameter set originally developed by Dr Jack Glendening. Typically a single overnight run.
- Shows
- Thermal updraft velocity, boundary-layer top, cumulus potential, wind profiles.
Good for: Where a well-maintained local instance exists it is often better tuned to the terrain than any global product, because a local pilot set it up for that ridge or that valley. Ask your club which instance they use — that is genuinely the only reliable way to find yours.
Watch for: **The failure mode is silence.** A RASP page can keep serving normally while the model behind it stopped running months ago. Before trusting one, check the run date on the page itself, not just that the page loaded. Instances also change URL when the volunteer running them changes.
Atmospheric soundings (Univ. of Wyoming)
Free, public
- Coverage
- Worldwide, wherever radiosondes are launched.
- Model
- Not a model. Actual measured balloon ascents, usually twice daily at 00Z and 12Z.
- Shows
- Temperature, dew point and wind against height.
Good for: The ground truth every model is trying to predict. Learning to read the morning sounding for your area is the highest-value soaring-weather skill there is, and it costs nothing.
Watch for: A 12Z sounding is a snapshot of the morning, not a forecast of the afternoon. It tells you what the air column was, and you supply the surface heating.
National Weather Service soaring pages (US)
Free, public
- Coverage
- United States, by forecast office.
- Model
- Varies by office.
- Shows
- Some NWS offices publish soaring-specific forecasts or discussion; most do not. Coverage depends entirely on whether a local forecaster has an interest.
Good for: Where a local office publishes one, the forecast discussion is often more useful than any map, because a human explains what they are uncertain about.
Watch for: Availability is patchy and not advertised. Search for your local office plus "soaring" and see what exists.
How this list is maintained
Prices and coverage were read from each service's own site on the date above. Everything here changes; if something is out of date, tell us.
We take no money from any of these. There are no affiliate links on this page and no sponsored placement. If that ever changes it will be stated at the top, not buried here.
We deliberately do not list individual RASP instances. They are run by volunteers, they move, and the failure that matters is silent: a RASP page can keep loading normally while the model behind it stopped running months ago. A link here would rot without anybody noticing. Ask your club which instance they use, and check the run date on the page itself every time.
Something out of date? Tell us →Related
Whatever the forecast says, the air on the day is denser or thinner than standard, and that changes your launch more than most pilots expect.
Density altitude calculator →