Snow explained

Regional estimate or detailed area: what Snowvy covers where

Snowvy aims to cover every snowy mountain on Earth. Not every place gets the same detail, so every place says what it has.

Four labels

Label	What it means
Resort area	A ski area with the full 30 m model: conditions slope by slope, sun and shade, runs and lifts.
Backcountry zone	The same 30 m model for a touring area without lifts, with touring routes instead of runs.
Regional estimate	A coarse answer for the region around you, in cells about 25 km across: snow line, new snow, wind and temperature by elevation band and broad aspect.
Not built yet	A mountain area with seasonal snow that has no model run yet. You still get terrain, slope angle, aspect and sun.

Why there are levels

Running the full model on every 30 m patch of every mountain range on Earth is not feasible all at once. So Snowvy builds detail where people ski and tour, in waves that take in every snowy region together, and is adding a regional layer so that no mountain area is left without an answer.

What a regional estimate can and cannot say

A regional estimate describes the region around you, not a particular slope. It assumes slopes of about 30° and leaves out shading by the surrounding terrain, shelter from the wind and forest. It can tell you that the snow line is around 1,400 m, that 40 cm fell above 2,000 m this week, or that north-facing slopes high up have had a long cold spell that favours weak layers. It cannot tell you about the gully in front of you. Snowvy never colours individual slopes from a regional estimate.

Not built yet means not built yet

When an area has no model, Snowvy says so. It never borrows the conditions of a neighbouring area, because snow can be completely different one valley over. You can ask for an area to be built; requests move areas up the list.

Both hemispheres

The northern season runs roughly October to June and the southern season roughly May to November, in New Zealand, Australia, the Andes and southern Africa. Outside its season an area shows its terrain and last season's history, not stale conditions.

Whatever the label

All of it is modelled context. None of it is an avalanche forecast. Find the official bulletin for where you are going.

Modelled, not an avalanche forecast. Snowvy explains the snowpack; it never says a slope is safe. Read your regional avalanche bulletin and make your own decisions.

Official avalanche bulletins: EAWS (Europe), avalanche.org (USA), Avalanche Canada, and every other official service we know of.

More explainers

• How sun and aspect change the snow
• What modelled snow conditions mean, and what they don't
• Surface hoar: the frost that becomes a weak layer
• Wind slab: how wind loads a slope
• Crusts and facets: why a hard layer can make a weak one
• Persistent weak layers: facets, depth hoar and a weak base
• Wet snow: how warmth, sun and rain change the snowpack
• New snow: what a storm does to the snowpack
• Surface snow and wind: what your skis will meet

See it on your slopes