Sun Behind Cloud Emoji

The sun behind cloud emoji (⛅) shows the sun and a larger cloud in roughly equal proportion, the original "partly cloudy" emoji and the one most weather apps default to when they can't decide. It's meteorologically "partly cloudy," which the U.S. National Weather Service defines as 3/8 to 5/8 opaque cloud cover (37.5-62.5%).

⛅ is the OG weather emoji. Approved in Unicode 5.2 (2009) as U+26C5U+26C5, it predated the more specific 🌤️ and 🌥️ by five years. When it shipped, the emoji weather vocabulary was just three characters: ☀️ (sun), ☁️ (cloud), and ⛅ (the mix). Anything between "clear" and "overcast" had to use this single emoji. That head start baked ⛅ into weather apps, keyboards, and push notifications before the 2014 expansion caught up.

Because ⛅ existed first, it became the cultural default for "the weather." iOS Weather and Apple widgets still use a sun-behind-cloud design for their partly cloudy state. The Samsung weather widget, the Android weather app, and most third-party weather apps converged on the same visual.

Emotionally, ⛅ carries the figurative weight of "partly cloudy": ambiguity, in-between states, the forecast-equivalent of "we'll see." Not clearly good, not clearly bad.

⛅ is the most-used emoji in the sun-cloud gradient because it's the oldest, the widest-supported, and the one weather apps picked up first.

Weather app icon by default. Open your phone's weather app on any day that isn't extreme, and you'll probably see some version of ⛅. It's the emoji equivalent of "normal day, nothing remarkable."

Ambiguity and uncertainty. "This week has been ⛅" reads as "mixed, could go either way." It's the emoji for genuinely ambivalent situations, not an optimistic 🌤️, not a gloomy 🌥️, not a doomed 🌧️. Just honestly unsettled.

Spring and autumn weather. ⛅ is the signature emoji of transitional seasons, days that start sunny and end cloudy, or the other way round. March vibes, October vibes, every "bring a layer" forecast.

Hope and silver linings. Because the sun is visible, ⛅ reads as mildly hopeful in a way ☁️ and 🌥️ don't. "Hang in there ⛅" works as a comfort message; it says "the sun's still up there somewhere."

Compared to its newer siblings: ⛅ is less precise than 🌤️ or 🌥️ but has more cultural momentum. If you're not sure which sun-cloud to use, ⛅ is the safe pick.

⛅ was one of the original Unicode 5.2 weather characters approved in October 2009. For the next five years, it was the only "mixed weather" emoji that existed. Every weather app, every iMessage, every Twitter weather complaint that wanted to say "sun and clouds today" had to use this character.

That five-year monopoly locked in ⛅ as the default visual for partly cloudy. When Unicode 7.0 (2014) finally added the granular set (🌤️🌥️🌦️🌧️🌨️🌩️), most people kept reaching for ⛅ out of habit. Weather apps even kept using ⛅-style icons for their generic "partly cloudy" state, the newer 🌤️ and 🌥️ never fully displaced it.

The Unicode name is simply SUN BEHIND CLOUD, with no "WHITE" prefix. That's because ⛅ was designed with colored emoji presentation in mind from the start, while the 2014 additions inherited the older "white sun" naming convention from symbol-font ancestors.

• •⛅ was the ONLY 'mixed weather' emoji from 2009 to 2014. For five full years, if you wanted to say anything between 'sunny' and 'cloudy' in emoji, this was your only tool. The 2014 Unicode 7.0 expansion added 🌤️🌥️🌦️🌧️🌨️🌩️ to finally give weather apps granular icons.
• •Global cloud cover averages about 67-68%, making partly cloudy the planet's dominant weather condition. Oceans run higher (around 72%) and land lower (around 55%). Most of Earth, most of the time, is some version of ⛅.
• •The forecast term 'partly cloudy' means 3/8 to 5/8 opaque cloud cover (37.5-62.5%). Only clouds that block the sun count, thin cirrus doesn't. ⛅ is the most technically correct icon for this narrow band.
• •The Unicode name is simply 'SUN BEHIND CLOUD' with no 'WHITE' prefix, unlike the 2014 weather additions (🌤️ 'WHITE SUN WITH SMALL CLOUD,' 🌥️ 'WHITE SUN BEHIND CLOUD'). ⛅ was named after modern emoji conventions were already in place.
• •The novel *Partly Cloudy* by Tanita S. Davis uses the partly cloudy weather state as an extended metaphor for mixed emotions, the figurative reading of ⛅ made literary.
• •Pixar's 2009 short film 'Partly Cloudy' (the Cloud Guy who makes babies) released the same year ⛅ was approved by Unicode. Coincidence, but culturally the emoji and the short share a moment.