WEATHER · SOIL TEMP
Soil Temp
Surface soil temperature (0 cm) — how warm or cold the top of the ground is, painted worldwide on the same cold-to-hot scale as the air. The frost, seed-germination and road-ice reading, distinct from air temperature (bare soil runs hotter by day, colder at night). A forecast field.
What it shows
Soil temperature shows how warm or cold the very top of the ground is, right at the surface (the 0 cm level), painted worldwide on the same cold-to-hot scale as the air-temperature field. It is a different reading from the air: under strong sun bare soil heats up well above the air temperature, and on a clear night it can cool below it, so the ground has its own daily rhythm. This is the number that governs whether seeds will germinate, whether there is frost on the ground, and whether roads are icing. It is a forecast field from the DWD ICON model, running forward along the timeline.
How to read it
Blues and purples are cold ground (at or below freezing — the frost and hard-ground zone); greens are cool, workable soil; yellows, oranges and reds are progressively warmer ground, the deep reds marking sun-baked surfaces in hot, dry regions. Compare it with the air Temperature field to see how far the surface runs ahead of or behind the air, with Freezing Level for the broader cold picture, and with Soil Moisture for the other half of the growing-conditions picture (how warm AND how wet the ground is). For gardeners the useful landmark is the green band: most seeds need the surface reliably above about 10°C / 50°F to get going. Tap the map for the value at any spot.
SEE IT LIVE
Open the full weather console with soil temp on, then stack other overlays and scrub the forecast.