Yes, driven by local data collection. More tightly packed ground stations and the availability of atmospheric measurement at various altitudes will improve accuracy.
I think it's mostly this. If you look at a weather radar map, sometimes you see a speckled pattern of rain where there is heavy rain in places, and 100 yards away there is no rain at all. No way you can predict that multiple days out.
I feel this living in the path of moisture coming from the Gulf of Mexico. My phone has gotten good at letting me know when the rain will start and stop to within a few minutes, but whatever data source Apple uses still struggles with near-term prediction (day+) in the summer when there are random popup storms all the time.
This. Just some days ago I had a conversation with meteorologist who said exactly this - the weather has never been easy to predict in northen Europe and it has become even less predictable with climate change and global warming.
Moving from Phoenix to Austin was a bit of a shock. Weather prediction in Phoenix is essentially perfect. In Austin the forecast seems much less accurate.
