Earth Data School
About
Full catalog/GPM_3CMB_DAY
GPM_3CMB_DAY·v07·dataset

How much it rained, radar plus microwave (GPM, daily)

GPM DPR and GMI (Combined Precipitation) L3 1 day 0.25 degree x 0.25 degree V07 (GPM_3CMB_DAY) at GES DISC
atmosphere NASA GES_DISC Level 3 active
In plain English

What it measures. Daily estimates of how much rain (and snow) fell, on a global grid of quarter-degree squares. It blends two ways of seeing precipitation into one combined rainfall figure.

How it's made. Built by merging readings from the GPM satellite's radar and its microwave imager, then summarizing them into daily totals on a 0.25-degree grid, covering the period since March 2014.

How & where you'd use it. Good for studying rainfall patterns, floods, and droughts, and for checking weather and climate models against real measured precipitation.

What's measured

ATMOSPHERE › ATMOSPHERIC WATER VAPORATMOSPHERE › PRECIPITATION

Coverage & cadence

  • Time span2014-03-08 → ongoing
  • Measured byGPM (DPR, GMI)
  • Processing levelLevel 3
  • Spatial extent-180, -67, 180, 67
  • StatusCOMPLETE

What you can do with it

  • Map air pollutants — NO₂, aerosols, ozone
  • Track greenhouse gases and Earth's energy budget
  • Feed weather and air-quality analysis
Official description

Version 07 is the current version of the data set. Older versions will no longer be available and have been superseded by Version 07. This is a precipitation product created from the combination of the Global Precipitation Measurement (GPM) Microwave Imager (GMI) and Dual-frequency Precipitation Radar (DPR) instruments and hence is covering the GPM epoch starting in March 2014. Similar product, using the GPM algorithm, has been created for the TRMM epoch (December 1997 - April 2015), and can be found under the name GPM_3CMB_TRMM_DAY

Get the data

gpm_3cmb_day_access.py
import earthaccess
earthaccess.login(strategy="netrc")          # free Earthdata Login

results = earthaccess.search_data(
    short_name="GPM_3CMB_DAY",
    version="07",
    bounding_box=(-122.5, 37.2, -121.8, 37.9),  # your area (W,S,E,N)
    temporal=("2024-01-01", "2024-12-31"),       # your dates
)
files = earthaccess.open(results)   # stream straight from GES_DISC
Browsing CMR needs no login. Downloading or streaming bytes needs a free Earthdata Login + the earthaccess package.