NOAA's Field Guide to the Ten Basic Cloud Types

NOAA’s JetStream education portal catalogs the ten fundamental cloud classifications used in modern meteorology, organized by altitude into high, middle, and low families plus the vertically developed group. The taxonomy traces back to Luke Howard’s early 19th-century Latin nomenclature and remains the working vocabulary for weather observers worldwide.

The reference covers cirrus, cirrostratus, and cirrocumulus at high altitudes; altostratus and altocumulus in the middle range; stratus, stratocumulus, and nimbostratus near the surface; and the towering cumulus and cumulonimbus that span multiple layers. Each entry pairs formation conditions with the weather patterns the cloud typically signals, from fair-weather puffs to the anvil-topped storm engines responsible for severe convective events.

The page functions as a primer for amateur observers and a quick reference for anyone needing to translate sky conditions into forecasting cues, grounding pattern recognition in the physics of moisture, temperature, and atmospheric stability.