Comparison · updated 11 August 2026
Hail history tools compared: which one to use
Five tools doing roughly the same thing with the same public NOAA data. What separates them is who they are written for and how they make money — including the two rows where we lose.
| Tool | Built for | Price | Coverage | Query precision | No sign-up | Map | What it adds | How it makes money |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| RoofTake | Homeowners | Free, no sign-up | 50 metro areas | ZIP prefix | Yes | No | 11 free tools, claim guides | Referral fee, disclosed |
| HailScore | Homeowners | Free score, paid PDF report | Nationwide | Exact address | Yes | Yes | 0–100 exposure score | Paid reports, pro subscriptions |
| HailTrace | Roofers, adjusters | Subscription | Nationwide | Exact address | No | Yes | Meteorologist-reviewed report | Pro subscriptions |
| Interactive Hail Maps | Roofers | Subscription | Nationwide, from 2011 | Map and address | No | Yes | Live alerts, hail swaths | Pro subscriptions |
| HailStrike | Roofers, insurers | Subscription | Nationwide | Map and address | No | Yes | Live storm tracking | Pro subscriptions |
Details of competing products come from their own public pages and can change. Something wrong? Tell us and we will fix it.
The short version
Use us if
You own a house, you want to know whether hail reached your area, and mostly you want to know what to do about it. Everything is free, nothing asks for an email, and before we send you to a contractor we tell you what we earn from it and whether filing a claim would pay you anything.
Use HailScore if
You need an exact-address lookup rather than a ZIP-level one, or you want a map. It is also the only other tool on this list written for homeowners rather than for trade. Their paid PDF report is cleanly separated from the free check, which is the honest way to do it.
Use HailTrace, Interactive Hail Maps or HailStrike if
You are a roofer, an adjuster or a broker and this is a working tool. Live alerts, hail swath maps and meteorologist-reviewed reports are things we do not offer and have no plan to. The subscription buys you real value.
One thing to watch for in all five
All five rest on the same radar estimate of how big a stone was in the storm cell aloft. Hail melts and breaks up on the way down, swaths are narrow, and the identical stone does something completely different to a four-year-old roof and a seventeen-year-old one. Whatever any of them shows you, the next step is always the same: somebody has to look at the roof. What radar can and cannot prove.
And a commercial one: most free "hail reports" online belong to a roofing company or a lead vendor, and they exist to get you a phone call. That is not wrong in itself — we live on referrals too. The difference is whether it is written at the top of the page or buried in the terms. Ours has its own page.
Common questions
Which one is best?
It depends who you are. If you own a house and want one free answer, start with us or with HailScore. If you are a roofer who needs to know at 7am where to send four crews, HailTrace, Interactive Hail Maps and HailStrike are built for exactly that and we will be no use to you at all.
Why are you recommending competitors?
Because a table where the author wins convinces nobody — and we lose on two rows. We have no map and no exact-address lookup. Hiding that would only mean you discover it yourself two minutes later.
So what are you better at?
Everything that happens after you learn the date. Eleven tools, sixteen articles on the claim process, a calculator that tells you when filing would pay you nothing, and a page stating exactly how much we make from you. The hail data is public and we all get it from NOAA — the difference is what you do with it.
Do you take money for placement in this table?
No. None of the companies listed knows this page exists and none has paid us anything. If something here is wrong, tell us and we will correct it — including the entries about our competitors.
Why don't you have a map?
Because a hail swath drawn on a map looks more precise than it actually is. Radar estimates stones aloft, not on the ground, and a coloured blob over your street invites a conclusion the data cannot support. A timeline of dates and sizes says the same thing without overstating it.
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