All types of winds existing on our planet.
| CLASS | NAME | FEATURES |
| Constant Winds that blow throughout the year, always in the same direction. |
Trade winds | They blow in the areas between the equator and the tropics: from north-east to southwest in the southern hemisphere; they are generated in tropical anticyclonic areas converging towards the equatorial zones. |
| Extratropicals | They blow in the equatorial zones where, due to the heating, masses of hot and humid air ascending are formed. | |
| Westerly winds | They blow between 35° and 60° in correspondence of the temperate zones: from the south-west to north-east in the northern hemisphere, from north-west to south-east in the southern hemisphere. They are regular winds of the temperate zone. | |
| Periodical winds Winds that periodically reverses the direction; they may be seasonal period, such as the monsoons and Etesian winds, or in daytime period day as the breezes. |
Monsoons (from the Arab word mausim, meaning season) |
They are wind systems characteristic of the Indian Ocean and China seas; they blow during the summer semester (April-October) from the ocean (anticyclone) to earth (India and Asia north-eastern, cyclonic areas); during the winter months from India to the ocean (East Africa). |
| Etesian winds (from the Greek word étos, meaning year) |
They blow during the summer, from the Aegean sea to Egypt, and in the opposite direction during the winter. | |
| Breezes | Moderate winds in daytime period. They are distinguished into sea and land breezes: blow throughout the day from sea to land and at night from land to sea, mountain and valley breezes: by day blow from the valley to the mountains and by night from the mountain to the valley; lake and shore breezws: they act as the previous. | |
| Variable or Local winds Winds that irregularly blow in the temperate zones every time that cyclonic or anticyclonic areas form. |
Scirocco south-east wind (from the Arab word shulùq, meaning noon wind) |
Warm wind that comes from the Sahara desert, proceeding from the south-west to north, becomes laden with moisture over the Mediterranean and reaches Europe humid and violent. |
| Mistral (fronancient Provencal maestral) |
Very cold wind that blows from the Central French Massif and reaches the maximum power in the Rhone valley. | |
| Fohn or west wind (from the Latin Favonius, favère, meaning to make grow) |
Hot, dry wind that mainly blows in spring and autumn in the alpine valleys to Austria and Switzerland, and sometimes reaches the Po Valley. | |
| Ghibli (from the Arab word qibli, meaning southern wind) |
Wind of the desert, very hot and filled with sand, which blows for about thirty days a year on the territories of Tunisia, Libya and Egypt. | |
| Khamsin (from the Arab word khamasin, 50) |
Hot, dry wind that blows in the Nile Delta from April to June. Lasts 3 to 5 days. | |
| Harmattan (from the Sudanese word haameta’n) |
Hot dry wind that blows very violent on the territories of West Africa. It coming from the north-west in winter and spring. |
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| Bora (from the Greek word boréas, north) |
Cold and very violent wind that blows from the Illyrian mountains in the former Yugoslavia to the coasts of Istria and Dalmatia and also in Trieste. It blows only in winter. | |
| Austro south wind (from the Latin auster, south wind) |
Warm wind that blows from the south. | |
| Gregale north-east wind (from the late Latin Graecalis, of the Greeks) |
Wind blowing from the north-east to south-west on the central and southern Mediterranean sea during the cold seasons. | |
| Maestrale north-west wind (from maestro as main) |
North-west wind. It is one of the winds that predominate on the Mediterranean sea. | |
| Tramontana north wind (from Latin trans montanus, beyond the mountains) |
Cold wind, sometimes violent, coming from the north in winter season and that can invest across the Italian peninsula | |
| Libeccio south-west wind (from Libycos, coming from Lybia) |
Wind from the west or from south-west, it is violent in all seasons. It blows over Corsica and on Tyrrhenian Italy. | |
| Chinook (from the name of a Native American tribes of the north-west of the United States of America) |
Hot, dry wind that blows from the north-west on the Rocky Mountains (USA) mainly in spring and autumn. | |
| Pampero (from pampas) |
Cold and humid wind blowing from the west between July and September especially on the Rio de la Plata (Argentina). | |
| Irregular or cyclonic winds | Cyclones | They are defined as irregular winds and are violently destructive with a whirling motion; they take different names according to country: Hurricanes in the Antilles and American coasts of the Atlantic, typhoons (from the Chinese t’ai fung, violent) in the Yellow Sea and the Philippines; Tornado (whirl, vortex) in the Great USA Plains and Australia. |