why does it hail and why does it snow?

Question

they are both frozen so why is there 2 different types?

Answer 1

I think it's because the hail is rain that freezes partway down, into hail stones. The snow starts colder farther up, so it turns into flakes (crystallizes) instead of staying droplets.

Answer 2

Hailstones are usually formed in a more turbulent system with strong updrafts. The updrafts blow the ice crystals back up into the cloud to collect more water, which freezes on as another layer. The cycle repeats until the hail stones are too heavy to be blown back up, or until the updraft changes and lets the hail stones fall.

Snow is when water mist is frozen while it's still a mist, and the crystals float to the ground.

Answer 3

This may take some time. Snow occurs when a cold front meets a warm front high above. Typically it manifests as rain, but in climates where it is cold, it is snow or frozen crystals of rain. The Hail comes from when the cold front rises into the warm front and when it comes down, it combines with the snow and produces large ice crystals. As these crystals fall, they form or gather the snow crystals and bond to them.

In effect, hail is snow crystals that bond to themselves and produce larger snow crystals known as hail.