100 British Words for Rain

In the UK, we talk incessantly about the weather. In a recent study, 94% of British people admitted to having talked about the weather in the past six hours, and 38% in the last hour.

There are a few reasons for this obsession;

The first is that we have a LOT of weather. In my hometown of Alston in northern England, it rains or snows 244 days a year. That means more than 2 out of 3 days are rainy or snowy!

Another reason is a bit less obvious. British people are famously inhibited. We have trouble starting conversations. But with a simple sentence like “Lovely weather for ducks, eh?”, we immediately start a conversation that everyone can get involved in, and agree with. Weather is our perfect icebreaker, and our doorway into deeper conversation.

So it might not surprise you just how much language we have for talking about rain.
Here are 100 words and phrases used in the various dialects of British English:

I’ve used these emojis to show what type of rain it is:

Light Rain: 🚿  Heavy Rain: 💧  With Wind: 💨  With lightning: ⚡

With ice: ❄️  Brief Rain: ⏳  Sudden Rain: 😲

So here you go, 100 words for rain!

1. Ache and pain (Cockney rhyming slang)
2. Bange (East Anglia), a sort of dampness in the air, w/ light rain 🚿
3. Bleeter (Scottish) 💧 ⏳
4. Bluffart (Scottish) ❄️ ⏳ 😲
5. Blunk (Shropshire) 💧 ⏳
6. Cloudburst 💧⚡😲
7. Cow quaker 💧
8. Dag of rain (Scottish) 🚿 ⏳
9. Deluge 💧
10. Dibble (Shropshire) Slow rain
11. Dimpsey (West country) 🚿
12. Downpour 💧
13. Dreich (miserable weather, Scottish)
14. Drencher 💧
15. Dringey (Norflk, Suffolk, Lincolnshire)🚿
16. Drisk (Cornwall) 🚿
17. Driving rain 💨
18. Drizzle 🚿
19. Duke of Spain (Cockney rhyming slang)
20. Flist (Scottish) 🚿
21. Flurry ⏳
22. Fox’s wedding (The West Country) 😲
23. Haar (Cornish, Scotlish, N. English), drizzle from the sea 🚿
24. Harle (Lincolnshire), drizzle from the sea 🚿
25. Haster (England), a violent storm⚡
26. Haud (Scottish) 😲
27. Hemple (West Country) 🚿
28. Hig (England)⚡ ⏳
29. Hurley Burley (England) 💧⚡
30. It’s beating down 💧
31. It’s chucking it down 💧
32. It’s coming down in buckets/bucketloads 💧
33. It’s coming down in sheets 💧
34. It’s coming down it torrents 💧
35. It’s drumming down, heavy rain heard through a roof 💧
36. It’s getting biblical out there 💧⚡
37. It’s hammering (it) down 💧
38. It’s henting (Cornwall) 💧
39. It’s hossin (Cumbrian) 💧
40. It’s hoyin it doon (N. E. England) 💧
41. It’s lashing (it) down 💧
42. It’s lattin (Shropeshire), Enough rain to make outdoor work difficult
43. It’s letty (Somerset), Enough rain to make outdoor work difficult
44. It’s luttering down 💧
45. It’s maumy (N. English/Scottish) 🚿
46. It’s pattering 🚿
47. It’s peeing (it) down 💧
48. It’s pelting (it) down 💧
49. It’s pissing (it) down 💧
50. It’s plothering down (Midlands and N. England) large droplets with no wind 💧
51. It’s pouring/pouring down 💧
52. It’s raining cats and dogs 💧
53. It’s raining chair legs, painfully heavy rain 💧
54. It’s raining like a cow reliving itself 💧
55. It’s raining sideways 💨
56. It’s raining stair rods, painfully heavy rain 💧
57. It’s raining upwards, rain so heavy that it bounces 💧
58. It’s siling/syling down (N. England) 💧
59. It’s spitting 🚿
60. It’s spluttering 🚿
61. It’s sprinkling 🚿
62. It’s stottin (N. England and Scottland) heavy rain that bounces 💧
63. It’s teeming from the heavens (N. Irish) 💧
64. It’s thrashing (it) down 💧
65. It’s throwing it down 💧
66. It’s tipping (it) down 💧
67. It’s tippling (it) down 💧
68. It’s yukken it doon (Cumbrian) 💧
69. It’s trickling 🚿
70. Kelsher, a heavy shower 💧 
71. Liquid sunshine, sudden rain on a sunny day 😲
72. Misla (Irish Traveller)
73. Mizzle (N.Engis), misty drizzle 🚿
74. Mochy weather (Scotish, N. Irish) 🚿
75. Monsoon, heavy summer rain 💧 
76. Mothery (Linconshire) 🚿
77. Nice weather for ducks!
78. Onslaught 💧 
79. Peeggirin (Scottish) a stormy shower 💧 
80. Plash (Northumbrian) 😲
81. Pleasure and pain (Cockney rhyming slang)
82. Plum shower (Scottish) 💧
83. Posh (Shropshire) 💧
84. Precipitation
85. Rain
86. Raining forks’tiyunsdown’ards (Lincolnshire) like it’s raining pitchforks 💧
87. Scotch mist 🚿
88. Sea fret (N. English) mizzle from the sea 🚿
89. Shower ⏳
90. Skew (Cornwall) ⏳
91. Skite (Scottish) 🚿 ⏳
92. Sleet ❄️
93. Smirr (Scottish) 🚿
94. Smizzle (Scottish) 🚿
95. Soaker 💧
96. Soft weather (N. Irish) 🚿
97. Squall  🚿
98. Steaking 🚿
99. The heavens have opened 😲
100. The smoky smirr o rain (Scotland) 🚿
101. The Wet
102. Thunderstorm ⚡
103. Torrent/Torrential 💧
104. Yillen (Scottish) 🚿 💨

Ok admittedly I got a bit carried away and went over the 100 mark, but there we go, 104 words for rain used in the UK!