Des Moines, IA UV Index Today

Hour by hour today

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

Des Moines today, in numbers

Latitude

41.6°N — 37 of 121 from the north

Today's peak

6 (High) — 87 of 121 nationally

Peak arrives

1pm local (GMT-5)

At or above 6

1 hour, 1pm to 2pm

At or above 3

6 hours, 11am to 5pm

The window from 1pm to 2pm is the practical answer for Des Moines today. Nationally today the spread runs 10.9 in Tucson (32°N) to 1.5 in Anchorage (61°N). Why latitude and the clock decide this →

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.

Where Des Moines sits on the scale

4.4 is Moderate. EPA suggests shade around midday, a hat and sunglasses. Today Des Moines also reaches 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 Des Moines 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 →