Madeira Live Weather and Webcam Data
Madeira Fun publishes live, per-place weather observations for Madeira: instrument readings from government weather stations, sunshine read directly from webcams, satellite cloud state, rain cross-checked against the IPMA precipitation radar, coarse crowd and sea-state estimates at beaches and pools, and wave height at surf spots. This page explains the sources, refresh schedule, field definitions and limitations, and links to the reusable open data feed (format MF-WX-1.0). Observations were last updated 21 Oct, 21:19 (Madeira local time).
What Madeira Fun observes
Madeira's microclimates change within a few kilometres, so a single island-wide forecast is not useful on the ground. Madeira Fun maintains a registry of 29 places across the island and stitches a current-conditions record for each one every 15 minutes, choosing the best available source per dimension rather than one blended feed.
Data sources
- IPMA weather stations: air temperature, humidity, wind, pressure and precipitation from the nearest of 21 official stations within 12 km. These are hourly instrument readings, not model output; Madeira Fun checks for newly published readings every 10 minutes so they land as soon as IPMA releases them.
- IPMA precipitation radar: the official radar composite for the archipelago, sampled at each place's exact coordinates every 15 minutes and used as an independent rain witness, day and night.
- IPMA weather warnings and UV index: official weather warnings for the Madeira archipelago and the daily UV index forecast, checked every 10 minutes and shown on the live weather page with IPMA attribution.
- Madeira Fun webcam observations: sunshine and sky condition read from live webcam frames by automated frame analysis every 15 minutes during daylight; the nearest camera within 4 km provides a place's sky reading. At selected beaches and pools the same analysis produces coarse crowd and sea-state estimates.
- EUMETSAT Meteosat: a satellite cloud classification sampled at each place's exact coordinates, day and night.
- Open-Meteo Marine: wave height at curated coastal spots, refreshed every 3 hours.
IPMA, EUMETSAT and Open-Meteo are independent organizations not affiliated with Madeira Fun; their data is redistributed here with attribution under their open licenses.
Field definitions
Weather type (weather_type_id, weather_type_en, weather_type_pt). The one weather type madeira.fun shows for the place, using the official weather-type classes of IPMA (Instituto Português do Mar e da Atmosfera) with IPMA's own English and Portuguese wording: 1 Clear sky, 2 Partly cloudy, 3 Sunny intervals, 4 Cloudy, 17 Fog, 15 Drizzle, 10 Light rain, 9 Rain/showers, 11 Heavy rain/showers. It is decided in this order: rain at the place with its strength (the camera's view, else the radar rate, else a recent gauge hour); then drizzle or fog seen by the camera; then the sky from the camera (only while the sun is up at the camera), else the station solar radiation, else the satellite cloud classification.
Sky and sunshine. Sky is one of clear, partly cloudy, mostly cloudy, overcast or foggy; sunshine is one of full sun, mostly sunny, filtered, dim or none. When a webcam provides the reading, the record discloses the camera (sky_ref) and source (sky_source = webcam); otherwise a clear-sky model on station solar radiation is used (sky_source = radiation).
Rain (is_raining, rain_mm, rain_source). Rain is confirmed by three independent witnesses, checked in order: the nearest station rain gauge (more than 0.1 mm in a reading whose hour ended within the last 60 minutes), the camera at or near the place on a clearly visible rain observation no older than 45 minutes (cloud cover alone never counts as rain), and the IPMA precipitation radar echo at the place's coordinates (0.5 mm per hour or more, no older than 25 minutes). rain_mm is always the gauge measurement in millimetres; rain_source names the deciding witness: a station name, a webcam, or "IPMA radar".
Crowd level (webcam estimate). One of empty, quiet, moderate or busy: how many people are visible relative to the space, judged from the camera at that exact place. Coarse buckets only; never a count.
Sea state (webcam estimate). One of calm, moderate or rough: the visible water surface at that place, shown as the Water badge on madeira.fun.
Wave height. Metres, from the Open-Meteo Marine model at the curated spot at that place.
Integrity rules
- Crowd and wave data never cross places. They appear only where a camera or marine spot exists at that exact location. A place without its own camera has no crowd value, even if a neighboring place 3 km away has one.
- Sky readings may use a nearby camera (up to 4 km): sky is regional in a way crowds are not, and each record discloses which camera it used.
- Every value carries its own observation timestamp; nothing is presented as fresher than it is. madeira.fun itself hides crowd estimates older than 45 minutes and wave heights older than 6 hours.
- Radar rates and official warnings are displayed, not redistributed. IPMA's radar rates, weather warnings and UV index render on madeira.fun with IPMA attribution; the open feed discloses radar only as a rain witness (rain_source), never the raw rates.
- Records are stamped with the format version (MF-WX-1.0). If definitions change, the version changes.
Current observations snapshot
A condensed view of the live dataset, last updated 21 Oct, 21:19 (Madeira local time). The full record set is in the feed below; each place links to its live card.
| Place | Weather | Temp | Crowd | Wave |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Funchal | Cloudy | 23°C | ||
| Câmara de Lobos | Clear sky | 22°C | ||
| Caniço | Clear sky | 21°C | ||
| Santa Cruz (Airport) | Cloudy | 22°C | ||
| Ribeira Brava | Cloudy | 22°C | ||
| Ponta do Sol | Cloudy | 22°C | ||
| Monte | Partly cloudy | 19°C | ||
| Calheta | Cloudy | 23°C | 1.3 m | |
| Jardim do Mar | Cloudy | 21°C | 1.3 m | |
| Paúl do Mar | Cloudy | 21°C | 1.3 m | |
| Madalena do Mar | Cloudy | 23°C | 1.0 m | |
| Ponta do Pargo | Cloudy | 19°C | ||
| Porto Moniz | Cloudy | 21°C | 1.4 m | |
| Seixal | Sunny intervals | 20°C | 1.3 m | |
| São Vicente | Sunny intervals | 20°C | 0.8 m | |
| São Jorge | Cloudy | 18°C | ||
| Santana | Sunny intervals | 16°C | ||
| Machico | Cloudy | 22°C | 1.1 m | |
| Caniçal / São Lourenço | Sunny intervals | 22°C | ||
| Santo da Serra | Cloudy | 15°C | ||
| Pico do Areeiro | Cloudy | 8°C | ||
| Rabaçal / 25 Fontes | Cloudy | 13°C | ||
| Bica da Cana / Paúl da Serra | Cloudy | 10°C | ||
| Porto Santo | Cloudy | 21°C | ||
| Porto da Cruz | Cloudy | 21°C | 1.2 m | |
| Curral das Freiras | Partly cloudy | 19°C | ||
| Boaventura | Sunny intervals | 21°C | ||
| Achada do Teixeira | Cloudy | 10°C | ||
| Praia do Faial | Sunny intervals | 20°C |
Data limitations
- Conditions can change within minutes; observation timestamps control.
- Crowd and sea state are visual estimates from a single camera angle, refreshed during daylight only.
- Wave height is model output for open water near the spot, not a measurement inside sheltered pools or harbours.
- The radar witness reads a grid cell around the place; very light or very local showers can be missed or slightly displaced.
- A station up to 12 km away can differ from the exact spot, especially with altitude.
- Gaps or outages may affect individual readings; affected values go null rather than stale.
Citation and reuse
The observations on this page and in the feed are published under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 license: you may reuse them, including for commercial use, with attribution. Suggested attribution: "According to Madeira Fun live weather data," with a link to this page. Third-party source attributions (IPMA, EUMETSAT, Open-Meteo) are carried inline in the feed.
Machine-readable distributions:
- JSON feed (https://madeira.fun/api/public/madeira-weather)
- CSV download (https://madeira.fun/api/public/madeira-weather.csv)
Both refresh on the same schedule as this page and carry the license and attribution inline. For bulk or historical data, or media enquiries, contact support@madeira.fun.