# Atlanta, GA UV Index Today — hourly UV forecast

> Source: https://breathecheck.com/uv-index/us/georgia/atlanta/
> UV index in Atlanta, GA right now, today's peak and the hour it arrives, on the EPA scale. Modelled data, labelled as modelled.

# Atlanta, GA UV Index Today

Modelled for 14 Sep 2026, 22:00 UTC · GMT-4

## What is the UV index in Atlanta right now?

0.9 Low

EPA describes low UV as needing no protection for most people.

Today's peak is 8 ( Very High ) at about 1pm local time.

## When is UV strongest in Atlanta today?

UV in Atlanta peaks at 8 (Very High) around 1pm local time (GMT-4). It stays at 6 or above — the high band — for 4 hours, roughly 12pm to 4pm. UV is 3 or above for 6 hours.

Local time, midnight to midnight. Bar colour is the EPA UV band, never restyled.

## Atlanta today, in numbers

- **Latitude**: 33.8°N — 97 of 121 from the north

- **Today's peak**: 8 (Very High) — 29 of 121 nationally

- **Peak arrives**: 1pm local (GMT-4)

- **At or above 6**: 4 hours, 12pm to 4pm

- **At or above 3**: 6 hours, 11am to 5pm

The window from 12pm to 4pm is the practical answer for Atlanta today. Nationally today the spread runs 11.4 in Hilo (20°N) to 1.3 in Fargo (47°N). Why latitude and the clock decide this →

## Canopy cover against a mid-afternoon peak

Canopy covers close to 45 percent of the city, per the 2023 assessment Georgia Tech and the City of Atlanta ran together, down from 47.9 percent when the same survey was first done in 2008. For UV that is the dominant local variable, and it appears nowhere in the index. The number published for the city is an open-sky value. Under a mature water oak or a stand of loblolly pine, what reaches the ground is a fraction of it, and one walk can cross that boundary a dozen times in a mile.

The clock is the second thing. Atlanta lies near 84.4°W, deep in the western half of the Eastern time zone, which pushes the sun’s highest point back to roughly 1:38 p.m. on daylight time, more than half an hour later against the clock than in New York or Boston. The strongest stretch of a summer day here is genuinely mid-afternoon, which puts it after most people have stopped thinking about it.

Elevation contributes a little and gets overlooked. Downtown sits near 1,050 feet on the Piedmont, well above the fall line that crosses Georgia through Macon and Augusta, which adds a few percent by WHO’s altitude rule. Humidity and the convective storms that pile up on July afternoons pull the other way, though WHO’s own guidance is that light or thin cloud has little effect and can even raise UV levels through scattering, so a dimmed Atlanta afternoon is not an empty one.

## Nearest metros we model

UV changes with latitude, not with a city boundary, so a neighbour a hundred miles north reads differently for a reason.

## What does Atlanta’s UV index mean today?

0.9 is Low. EPA describes low UV as needing no protection for most people. Today Atlanta also reaches Very High at its peak — a different band from the one it is in right now, which is why the hour matters as much as the day.

The scale is open-ended: 11 is where the named bands stop, not the maximum. All five bands, with the EPA guidance for each →

## Modelled, not measured

The UV figures for Atlanta are computed by the Copernicus atmosphere model, not read off an instrument here — unlike the AQI on our air-quality pages, which comes from a regulatory monitor . Cloud is where a UV model is weakest. What that means in practice →

## Questions about UV in Atlanta

**What is the UV index in Atlanta today?**

0.9 right now (Low), peaking at 8 around 1pm local time. UV stays at 6 or above for 4 hours, from about 12pm to 4pm. This is a modelled value, not a ground measurement.

**When is UV strongest in Atlanta today?**

Around 1pm local time (GMT-4), not at noon — solar noon drifts across a timezone and daylight saving moves it later on the clock.

**Is this measured or modelled?**

Modelled. The figures come from the Copernicus atmosphere model via Open-Meteo , unlike the AQI on our air-quality pages, which is read from an EPA regulatory monitor. Cloud cover is where a UV model is weakest.

## Related

On this page

Air quality alerts

We alert on AQI, not UV — UV is predictable from the calendar, air quality is not.

Updated 14 Sep 2026, 22:00 UTC