Quiz: Name that Cloud!

| by The Weather Channel Meteorologists

Select the name of the cloud formation pictured below. Post your scores in the comments below!


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191 Comments

  1. I missed 1! And I call myself a storm chaser?! Lol it was the cumulus one but it was kind of a trick question. 😛 Loophole loophole! 🙂 Fun quiz though!

      1. Most of the time when there are rainSHOWERS (associated with CUMULOFORM clouds there are several layers—STRATOFORM, not so much—

  4. 4 out of 10..I kept second guessing myself..I would have had 6 maybe 7..I’m no pro meteorologist but I love weather dynamics and the science of it…I’m weather geek all the way!..love this new site!

  19. 9 out of 10. Felt good about still having my eye for cloud types after 57 years ago when I first started learning cloud types.

    1. great job! It’s a useful skill to identify clouds – good conversation starter when there is a cool sky 😉

  20. I live in Kansas and a lot of those clouds are in my sky. I didn’t do very good on your quiz, love it anyway.

    1. You see many, but the “big one” you have so many of are not clouds—They are debris , sucked up by the low pressure—

    1. I was a USAF observer—sixteen weeks schooling, then three years active, and I’m still an ametuer—

  27. Oops! 6 correct. And I was a trained wx observer in the 1970s. Oh well! Great refresher.

    2. WayneJ—We are kindred twenty or so years apart (early 50’s)—Wasn’t it fun !!!—I still look up first thing out of the house in the morning—Is there still such a thing as a Weather OBSERVER ???

  29. Totally guessing gave me fifty percent. Imagine what I could have done if I were even slightly concerned with the NAMES of cloud formations. How about fluffy, cottony, well-textured, bumpy-lookin’, windblown, stormy, take-cover-right now, and oh-HELL!

    1. On the train to my first assignment out of observers school—-four of us —one of the four looked out of the window and proclaimed loudly “FEW CU”—I slid down in my seat—

  30. Hhmmm, my 1st post above didn’t sound good…lol. Meant wrong. Oh well Jen(MaryAnn), what was your score? ;-)… .

    1. Don’t second guess yourself—At 88 (and for a long time now) I think of many other things I might have done (including brain surgery)

  32. Thanks Jen, Great quiz… I’m a pilot and should be able to name all 10 but I got 7 out of 10…. Glad I got Cumulonimbus right though… thats the cloud formation I avoid!!!!
    Thanks again!!!

    2. prapp—-I would say you are alive today because you knew not to fly through the lower two thirds of one—(or was it one third)—so long ago I forget —I always wondered how much attention you pilots paid to us observers, except do I have minimums to go, and of course they always insisted they did—of course, when you are in the air, you are on your own—I have been there , too—Thanks—EW—

      1. Well, it doesn’t matter which third or any point. Going into Towering Cumulus or a maturing T-storm when it can be avoided is signing your own death warrant. Updrafts or downdrafts, hail and turbulence can be in any level. Microbursts and low level wind shear around a storm causes more problems because they can occur around the edges of the storm.

  33. Tricky Jen(MaryAnn), tricky. I got 3 wrong ;-(… . I wonder how many if any you got right? Dave 😉

  42. Great quiz, Jen. I only got six correct so I guess i need to study up. It’s hard when FIOS refuses to put TWC back on the air as I miss all of you and I don’t learn anything from the other weather staion. Si just do it the easy way and not watch the channel.

  43. I thought you wanted us to give them names, not identify them. 😂 I was fortunate to answer 5 correctly.

    1. I agree with jlc33701. The quiz said to name the clouds, so I did, being careful to use equal numbers of masculine & feminine names.

      1. I saw one the other day that I named EVANS (for me), because I was sure no one had ever seen it before—-Unfortunately, three minutes later it was GONE—

  45. forgot most have not done this in years thanks I need to stud and refresh my memory

      1. As an Observer (1952 or so, Georgia, Germany, France) I won’t look at it—-My ego couldn’t take it—EW—

      1. HI Dewpoint. Yes, it was a rather tricky test of your (our) cloud knowledge. Many of the pictures seemed to be borderline between one or the other and were difficult to discern. I just wondered if you were a meteorologist or not since your pic looks very nice. Thanks Gator

    6. honneybunny, If you ever get old enough, I’ll marry you–(from an old worn out ex-observer)—

    8. my Mom was Canadian and a huge sky watcher, also a weather tracker each day written on her calendar. I got 7 right and I think I can thank her for that.