Home / Weather phrases
Hangman Phrases About Weather
60 phrases, written for Hangman Phrases and sorted so you can pick the right one fast.
Weather is the easiest theme to set, because every phrase is already shared: raining cats and dogs, the calm before the storm, puddles the whole way home. Nobody needs a category and nobody is excluded, which is why it works with any group.
Weather is the one subject everybody has an opinion about and nobody has to study. That makes it close to ideal for this game: the vocabulary is ordinary, the scenes are universal, and the sayings have been in the language so long that recognition does most of the work.
The three shelves run from the sayings everybody uses, through small scenes from particular kinds of day, to a handful that lean on an awkward letter and will slow a confident group down.
Sayings everybody uses
Idioms so worn in that most tables call them half revealed. The right place to start a themed round, because the first win sets the tone.
- Raining cats and dogs
- The calm before the storm
- Come rain or shine
- Under the weather
- Every cloud has a silver lining
- Weather the storm
- A storm in a teacup
- Right as rain
- Chasing rainbows
- On cloud nine
- Save it for a rainy day
- Make hay while the sun shines
- Take a rain check
- It never rains but it pours
- Steal somebody thunder
- A ray of sunshine
- Snowed under
- Break the ice
- Throw caution to the wind
- Any port in a storm
A particular kind of day
Small scenes rather than sayings. Longer and more visual, so they play kindly and the reveal arrives as a picture rather than a phrase.
- Puddles the whole way home
- The first warm day of the year
- An umbrella turned inside out
- Rain against the window at night
- Too hot to sleep
- Waiting for the shower to pass
- Steam rising off the road
- Wind that takes your breath
- The sky going dark at noon
- Snow that settles on nothing
- A rainbow nobody photographs
- Frost on the inside of a window
- Sun that lies about the cold
- The gritter goes past
- Wrong coat for the weather
- Thunder a long way off
- Washing out and it rains
- The first clear night in weeks
- Leaves all over the path
- Warm enough to sit outside
Harder going
Shorter, or holding a letter guessers leave until late. These are the ones to set when the table has stopped finding it interesting.
- Freezing fog
- A hazy horizon
- Flash flood
- Squally showers
- Blizzard warning
- Humid and still
- A sky full of jackdaws
- Drizzle all day
- Gusts from the west
- Hailstones the size of peas
- Low cloud on the hill
- A sudden downpour
- Icy underfoot
- Muggy by midday
- Dry spell
- Wind chill
- Thaw overnight
- Lightning and no thunder
- Heatwave in April
- Quiet grey afternoon
Why some of these work so well
The most reliable opener in the whole category. Long, absurd and known to every child, and the common letters are everywhere in it.
The hardest here. Two Qs worth of trouble from one, a Y doing vowel work, and a repeated S and L that mislead rather than help. Very few tables get it without hints.
Universally true, instantly recognised, and made entirely of short common words, so it is the friendliest long entry on the page.
Ten letters, two words, and the double L is the only real clue. Short phrases are hard ones, and this is the clearest example on this page.
Tips for using this list
The easiest theme to announce
Saying weather gives almost nothing away, because the category is enormous. That makes it one of the few themes where announcing costs the setter nothing.
Set the weather that is happening
A phrase about the rain while it is raining on the window lands twice as well. It costs nothing to glance outside before choosing, and the reaction is noticeably better.
Good for a long wait
Weather phrases suit a queue, a delayed train or a wet afternoon indoors, which is exactly when this game gets played. The subject is already on everyone's mind.
Common questions
What are good weather phrases for hangman?
Sayings everybody already uses, like raining cats and dogs, the calm before the storm and come rain or shine, plus small scenes such as puddles the whole way home. Both carry the theme without excluding anybody.
Is weather a good hangman theme for children?
One of the best. The vocabulary is ordinary, the scenes are familiar from any wet walk to school, and the first shelf here is long and full of common letters, which is what makes a phrase kind.
What is the hardest weather phrase?
Squally showers, for the Q, the Y doing a vowel's work and the repeated letters that mislead. Wind chill is the hardest short one, because ten letters give almost nothing away.
Should I announce the category for a weather round?
You can, and it costs less here than anywhere else, because weather covers so much that the hint narrows very little. That makes it a good theme for a mixed group where fairness matters.