In a one month prospective, double blind study of 70 patients (35 with rheumatoid arthritis [RA], 35 with osteoarthritis [OA]), severity of rheumatic symptoms was compared to changes in daily weather conditions using a visual analogue scale. The majority of patients (62%) believed that various aspects of weather aggravated their symptoms. There was no difference in age, sex, diagnosis or perceived symptom severity between weather sensitive and weather insensitive patients. No significant correlation was found between symptoms of any patient group or individual and any of 13 combinations of weather features. These results suggest that contrary to the belief of the majority of patients with RA or OA external weather conditions do not significantly influence the day-to-day symptoms of arthritis.