Enter the air temperature and wind speed into the Wind Chill Calculator to find out what the temperature actually feels like on exposed skin. Choose your preferred units — Fahrenheit or Celsius for temperature, and mph, km/h, m/s, or knots for wind speed — and get the wind chill temperature along with a danger level rating.
Wind Chill Temperature
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Actual Air Temperature
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Feels Colder By
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Danger Level
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Frostbite Risk
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Wind chill is the apparent temperature felt on exposed skin due to the combined effect of cold air and wind. Wind increases the rate at which the body loses heat through convection — as moving air replaces the thin warm layer around your skin — making the air feel colder than the actual thermometer reading.
This calculator uses the NWS/Environment Canada formula adopted in November 2001: Wind Chill (°F) = 35.74 + 0.6215T − 35.75(V^0.16) + 0.4275T(V^0.16), where T is air temperature in °F and V is wind speed in mph. This replaced the older Siple-Passel formula and was validated with human subjects in controlled cold-chamber experiments.
Wind chill is only meaningful when the air temperature is at or below 50°F (10°C) and wind speed is above 3 mph (5 km/h). At higher temperatures or in calm conditions, wind does not significantly increase heat loss from the body.
Wind chill describes the cooling sensation on human (and animal) skin only — it does not cause inanimate objects like water pipes or car engines to cool below the actual air temperature. An object will only cool to the ambient air temperature, regardless of wind speed.
When wind chill temperatures drop below −18°F (−28°C), frostbite can occur on exposed skin in as little as 30 minutes. Below −40°F (−40°C), frostbite can set in within 5–10 minutes. Always cover exposed skin and limit time outdoors in extreme wind chill conditions.
Wind chill measures how cold the air feels due to wind in cold weather, while the heat index measures how hot it feels due to humidity in warm weather. Both are 'feels like' temperatures, but they apply to opposite ends of the temperature spectrum and involve different physical mechanisms.
Your body generates heat, which warms a thin layer of air around your skin. Wind disrupts and removes this warm boundary layer through convection, forcing your body to work harder to maintain its temperature. The faster the wind, the more rapidly heat is carried away, making you feel colder.
No. Wind chill is a perceived or 'feels like' temperature — a thermometer placed outdoors will always read the actual air temperature, not the wind chill. Wind chill only describes the rate of heat loss from exposed human skin and is not a physical temperature measurement.