CARROT Weather 5.4: XL Widgets, Time Sensitive Notifications, Complication Customization, Themes, Icons, and More

Last week, Brian Mueller released CARROT Weather 5.4 alongside the iOS and iPadOS update. The update takes advantage of new iOS and iPadOS 15 features and continues to put more control in the hands of users with new customization options, themes, and icons.

CARROT Weather 5.4 takes advantage of the new XL widgets in iPadOS 15 and the time sensitive notifications on both platforms. On the iPad, CARROT Weather now offers XL Maps and Forecast widgets. The added space allows the XL Maps widget to show weather maps for a wide geographic area. For me here in the Chicago area, that means I can see weather conditions for a big chunk of Illinois as well as parts of Wisconsin, Iowa, Indiana, Ohio, and Michigan, an area covering about 500 miles from east to west and 200 miles north and south.

The XL Forecast widget is big enough to include the:

• Current conditions
• High and low temperatures for the day
• Wind speed and direction
• Chance of precipitation
• Sunrise or sunset times
• Moon phase
• An hourly forecast for the next 10 hours
• A 7-day forecast

With just one widget, you’ve got all the information that most people want in one place without even opening CARROT Weather.

The app also adopts Apple’s new time sensitive notification system. They can be turned off, but by default, rain, lightning, and weather alert notifications will break through any Focus modes you have created. Also, CARROT now offers NOAA critical warnings of weather that may cause considerable or catastrophic damage.

On the customization side of things, CARROT Weather 5.4 includes themes and icon sets. There are a couple of choices for the app’s backgrounds and a long list of accent colors available. Plus, there are five icon sets that range from colorful weather condition icons to more subtle outlined glyphs.

Brian Mueller has also updated the designs of the Current Observations, Hourly Forecast, and Daily Forecast screens of the app. The new designs are more than a fresh coat of paint. Particularly the Hourly and Daily Forecasts do an excellent job of packing a lot of information into a single screen in a way that remains glanceable. The screens also add new data points.

Last but not least, the CARROT Weather Apple Watch app has been updated with a new Smart Data Points Complication. The feature works like the cards in the iOS and iPadOS app’s main UI. You pick the data points that matter to you from a long list, set threshold values for them, and drag them into priority order. Then, as thresholds are met, those data points are displayed automatically in the Apple Watch complication.

I set up data points for the sunrise and sunset, precipitation, wind speed, air quality index, and UV index, so I can see at a glance what it’s like outside before I head out for a walk or run. The cards in the iPhone and iPad app work the same way, and I love that the same sort of timely update of relevant data is available on the watch now too.

The app has also added nine new secret locations and an additional achievement to unlock.

Apple’s redesigned Weather app is quite nice and offers more weather data than before, but you can’t beat CARROT Weather’s customization options. I always appreciate the ability to tinker with the apps I use to get them set up exactly the way I like. The weather stats that are important to people vary widely depending on where you live, the time of day, what you do each day, and a myriad of other factors. CARROT Weather leans into those differences by letting its users decide what’s important to them in a fun and delightful way.

CARROT Weather 5.4 is available on the App Store as a free update. Certain features require a subscription.