What is the difference between snow and rain?

Answer 1

There are some clouds that based on appearance are most likely to produce rain (low and very dark in color, or very vertically developed cumulus), but much of our midlatitudeprecipitation comes from stratiform clouds that may produce either rain or snow.

Most of our rain actually forms as ice in the cloud layer and melts on the way down, so it is actually melted snow. Much depends on the temperature of the atmosphere between the clouds and the ground.

As I understand it, dark color tends to indicate higher liquid water content rather than ice, and low means warmer temps, which is why I'd cautiously say that low dark clouds are more likely to be rain.

An awful lot of the time, the look of the clouds probably can't tell you whether to expect snow or rain unless you're a seasoned expert. You can try to judge by what the temperatures outside seem like, and by estimating the environmental lapse rate (the change in temperature with altitude).

There is still quite a debate about this; some people would swear that rain clouds and snow clouds are different, and say they can see in the clouds when it looks like snow.

Tropical rain, of course, is more likely to form as water in the first place - but in tropical regions you're not wondering whether it'll be rain or snow!

A quick check of any meteorology or physical geography text should allow you to read about the two major ways precipitation forms in clouds: the collision-coalescence process (only gives rain) or the Bergeron Ice-Crystal process (could give rain or snow).

Answer 2

Both are condensed moisture from the air. In the case of snow, the molecules of water join other molecules that are crystalized because of cold temperature. In rain, the molecules have not crystalized. With sleet, the molecules initially join together as liquid rain and later solidify.

Answer 3

Snowflakes are in the form of a crystal, with lots of air spaces. Frozen rain is a solid with little air. It is more dense, does not blow in the wind. Snow actually provides some degree of insulation from severe cold, frozen rain does not.

Answer 4

When the rain and ice droplets are suspended in the air, they are both water and as they fall they go thorugh a (field of cold) where it freezes them instantly.

Answer 5

No