Grain Studios: ASCII Weather
An iPhone weather app drawn entirely in text. Every condition has its own ASCII drawing, the 10-day forecast is one monospace line per day, and the radar is rain mapped in characters.
- Role
- Designer & Developer
- Platform
- iOS
- Industry
- Weather & Utilities
- Focus
- Product Design & iOS Engineering
Project Overview
ASCII Weather shows the weather the way a terminal would. The current conditions get a full ASCII drawing, with separate art for clear skies, fog, rain, snow and thunderstorms. The 10-day forecast is one aligned line per day, each with a small glyph, the high and low, and the chance of rain. Swipe once more and the radar draws the rain around you as characters, with your location marked O.
The art adapts wttr.in's weather glyphs. Every weather code maps to a full drawing and a compact glyph, generated from one approved art set, and it's all set in SF Mono.
Forecasts come from Apple Weather. Radar covers the US and Canada, using Environment and Climate Change Canada and NOAA data. There's no account, no ads and no tracking.
Key Features
- →Three screens you swipe between: Now, 10 Days and Radar
- →A distinct ASCII drawing for every condition, and a compact glyph for each day of the forecast
- →ASCII rain radar for the US and Canada, with your location marked
- →Save up to ten cities and switch between them
- →°F / °C toggle, your location or any city by search, pull to refresh
- →Controls are bracketed text, like [ cities ], [ °F ] and [ i ], so the interface is typography too
- →No account, no ads, no tracking, and location is rounded before it leaves the phone
Design Approach
Design came first. The full art set and the high-fidelity screens were locked in Figma before I wrote any view code, so the build was implementing decisions, not making them.
The constraint was that everything is text: one monospace font on a dark terminal background, with a single cool accent for the parts you can tap. Buttons aren't shapes, they're words in brackets. The temperature is the only large element on the screen, so it reads at a glance.
Privacy got the same care as the art. The app rounds your location to about a kilometer before it asks for a forecast, and the radar request covers a wider snapped area, so no request ever carries your exact position.
Design Screens
Outcome
ASCII Weather is headed to the App Store for iPhone, listed as ASCII Weather Forecast. It's a paid app with no subscription and no ads.
Current conditions, the 10-day forecast, radar, saved cities and units are all in the first release.