A weather front is a boundary separating two masses of air of different densities, and is the principal cause of meteorological phenomena. In surface weather analyses, fronts are depicted using various colored lines and symbols, depending on the type of front. The air masses separated by a front usually differ in temperature and humidity. Cold fronts may feature narrow bands of thunderstorms and severe weather, and may on occasion be preceded by squall lines or dry lines. Warm fronts are usually preceded by stratiform precipitation and fog. The weather usually clears quickly after a front's passage. Some fronts produce no precipitation and little cloudiness, although there is invariably a wind shift.

Cold fronts and occluded fronts generally move from west to east, while warm fronts move poleward. Because of the greater density of air in their wake, cold fronts and cold occlusions move faster than warm fronts and warm occlusions. Mountains and warm bodies of water can slow the movement of fronts.When a front becomes stationary, and the density contrast across the frontal boundary vanishes, the front can degenerate into a line which separates regions of differing wind velocity, known as a shearline. This is most common over the open ocean

Front types

There are two different words used within meteorology to describe weather around a frontal zone. The term anafront describes boundaries which show instability, meaning air rises rapidly along and over the boundary to cause significant weather changes. Katafronts are weaker, bringing smaller changes in temperature and moisture, as well as limited rainfall.

Cold front

A cold front is located at the leading edge of the temperature drop off, which in an isotherm analysis shows up as the leading edge of the isotherm gradient, and it normally lies within a sharp surface trough. Cold fronts can move up to twice as quickly as, and produce sharper changes in weather than, warm fronts, since cold air is denser than warm air and rapidly replaces the warm air preceding the boundary. On weather maps, the surface position of the cold front is marked with the symbol of a blue line of triangle-shaped pips pointing in the direction of travel, and it is placed at the leading edge of the cooler air mass.[2] Cold fronts come in association with a low pressure area. The concept of colder, dense air "wedging" under the less dense warmer air is often used to depict how air is lifted along a frontal boundary. The cold air wedging underneath warmer air creates the strongest winds just above the ground surface, a phonemena often associated with property-damaging wind gusts. This lift would then form a narrow line of showers and thunderstorms if enough moisture were present.

Warm front

Warm fronts are at the leading edge of a homogeneous warm air mass, which is located on the equator ward edge of the gradient in isotherms, and lie within broader troughs of low pressure than cold fronts. A warm front moves more slowly than the cold front which usually follows because cold air is denser and harder to remove from the Earth's surface. This also forces temperature differences across warm fronts to be broader in scale. Clouds ahead of the warm front are mostly strati form, and rainfall gradually increases as the front approaches. Fog can also occur preceding a warm frontal passage. Clearing and warming is usually rapid after frontal passage. If the warm air mass is unstable, thunderstorms may be embedded among the strati form clouds ahead of the front, and after frontal passage thundershowers may continue. On weather maps, the surface location of a warm front is marked with a red line of semicircles pointing in the direction of travel.

Stationary front and shearline
A stationary front is a non-moving (or stalled) boundary between two air masses, neither of which is strong enough to replace the other. They tend to remain essentially in the same area for extended periods of time, usually moving in waves. There is normally a broad temperature gradient behind the boundary with more widely spaced isotherm packing.
A wide variety of weather can be found along a stationary front, but usually clouds and prolonged precipitation are found there. Stationary fronts either dissipate after several days or devolve into shear lines, but they can transform into a cold or warm front if conditions aloft change. Stationary fronts are marked on weather maps with alternating red half-circles and blue spikes pointing in opposite directions, indicating no significant movement.
When stationary fronts become smaller in scale, degenerating to a narrow zone where wind direction changes significantly over a relatively short distance, they become known as shearlines.A shearline is depicted as a line of red dots and dashes.