How much snow is Tahoe getting?
No snow in the forecast at any Tahoe pass, resort or town in the next 72 hours. The NWS seven-day forecast has none either. Read Oct 20, 3:03 PM PDT or later from the National Weather Service.
From the National Weather Service’s gridded forecast, read every 30 minutes at each point below.
Storm alerts
A notification on this device when chain control starts, changes or lifts, or a road closes or reopens. Pick your roads:
An alert is a heads-up that something changed, not a road report, and it can arrive a few minutes after the change. Before you drive, check Caltrans QuickMap or Nevada 511 (nvroads.com), or call 511. A few alerts a day at most; no account, no email, and you can turn them off here any time (what we keep).
How much snow is Tahoe getting: NWS snowfall for the next 72 hours at Donner, Echo Summit, Mt Rose, Kingsbury, Carson Pass, nine resorts and five towns.
Every row is the National Weather Service's own gridded forecast for that spot, read every 30 minutes: the snow it expects in the next 72 hours, when the heaviest of it falls, and the snow level while it is falling. The passes come first because they decide the drive, then the resorts, then the towns.
The same storm can be two feet at Kirkwood and rain in Reno. Height does most of that: the passes and resort bases sit between about 6,000 and 9,000 feet, the lake at about 6,200, Reno at about 4,500. The snow level column says where rain turns to snow.
Snow in the next 72 hours, place by place
| Place | Height | Next 72 hours | Snow level | NWS updated |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Donner Summit | 7,239 ft | none | 10,000 ft → 8,500 ft | Oct 20, 2:00 PM PDT |
| Echo Summit | 7,382 ft | none | 10,000 ft → 8,000 ft | Oct 20, 2:00 PM PDT |
| Mt Rose Summit | 8,911 ft | none | 10,000 ft → 8,500 ft | Oct 20, 12:01 PM PDT |
| Kingsbury Grade | 7,334 ft | none | 10,000 ft → 8,500 ft | Oct 20, 12:01 PM PDT |
| Carson Pass | 8,574 ft | none | 10,000 ft → 8,000 ft | Oct 20, 2:00 PM PDT |
| Mt Rose Ski Tahoe | 7,864 ft (grid) | none | 10,000 ft → 8,500 ft | Oct 20, 12:01 PM PDT |
| Heavenly | 7,175 ft (grid) | none | 10,000 ft → 8,500 ft | Oct 20, 12:01 PM PDT |
| Palisades Tahoe | 6,283 ft (grid) | none | 10,000 ft → 8,500 ft | Oct 20, 12:01 PM PDT |
| Northstar | 6,467 ft (grid) | none | 10,000 ft → 8,500 ft | Oct 20, 12:01 PM PDT |
| Kirkwood | 8,268 ft (grid) | none | 10,000 ft → 8,000 ft | Oct 20, 2:00 PM PDT |
| Sugar Bowl | 6,982 ft (grid) | none | 10,000 ft → 8,500 ft | Oct 20, 2:00 PM PDT |
| Boreal | 7,195 ft (grid) | none | 10,000 ft → 8,500 ft | Oct 20, 2:00 PM PDT |
| Sierra-at-Tahoe | 7,221 ft (grid) | none | 10,000 ft → 8,000 ft | Oct 20, 2:00 PM PDT |
| Diamond Peak | 7,037 ft (grid) | none | 10,000 ft → 8,500 ft | Oct 20, 12:01 PM PDT |
| Truckee | 5,830 ft (grid) | none | 10,000 ft → 8,500 ft | Oct 20, 12:01 PM PDT |
| Tahoe City | 6,227 ft (grid) | none | 9,500 ft → 8,500 ft | Oct 20, 12:01 PM PDT |
| Incline Village | 6,430 ft (grid) | none | 10,000 ft → 8,500 ft | Oct 20, 12:01 PM PDT |
| South Lake Tahoe | 6,293 ft (grid) | none | 10,000 ft → 8,500 ft | Oct 20, 12:01 PM PDT |
| Reno | 4,600 ft (grid) | none | 10,000 ft → 8,500 ft | Oct 20, 12:01 PM PDT |
The passes and resorts, one page each
Each has the forecast twelve hours at a time, the temperatures and wind, the heights of the cameras around it, and the chain control on the road there now.
- How much snow is Donner Pass getting?
- How much snow is Echo Summit getting?
- How much snow is Mt Rose getting?
- How much snow is Heavenly getting?
- How much snow is Palisades Tahoe getting?
- How much snow is Northstar getting?
- How much snow is Kirkwood getting?
- How much snow is Sugar Bowl getting?
- How much snow is Sierra-at-Tahoe getting?
- How much snow is Boreal getting?
The points the forecast is read at: passes, resort base areas and towns.
Snow on the pass is a road question
A forecast tells you what is coming; the chain control tells you what the road is like now. Each pass has a live answer, read every five minutes from Caltrans and NDOT:
- Do I need chains on Donner Pass right now?
- Do I need chains on the Mt Rose Highway right now?
- Do I need chains on Echo Summit right now?
- Do I need chains on Carson Pass right now?
- Do I need chains on Kingsbury Grade right now?
- Every pass camera, with its chain control
- Tahoe ski resort opening days
Where this forecast comes from
The National Weather Service forecasts the Tahoe basin from two offices: Reno for the east side and the lake, Sacramento for the west slope and the crest. Both publish a gridded forecast, cells about 2.5 kilometres across, with the snow expected in each three- to six-hour interval. The totals here are the sum of those amounts for the next 72 hours, rounded to the half inch under 3 inches and to the whole inch above. Nothing is added to them. The forecasters’ own discussion, which explains the uncertainty, is at NWS Reno and NWS Sacramento.
Snow forecast: National Weather Service (api.weather.gov), public domain, read every 30 minutes. Not an official NWS product. Nevada Explorer is not affiliated with the National Weather Service. A forecast is not the road: confirm at roads.dot.ca.gov, nvroads.com or 511 before you travel.