На улице идёт снег.

Because на улице is the normal Russian expression for outside / outdoors / in the street.

• улица literally means street
• на улице literally means on the street
• but in many everyday contexts, Russians use it in the broader sense of outside

So in this sentence, На улице идёт снег means something like It’s snowing outside.

В улице is not how Russian expresses this idea.

улице is in the prepositional case, singular.

The basic form is:

• улица = street

After на when talking about location, Russian often uses the prepositional case:

• на улице = on the street / outside

So:

• nominative: улица
• prepositional: на улице

The ending changes from -а to -е, which is very common for feminine nouns of this type.

Yes, идти often means to go / to be going, but Russian uses it much more broadly than English uses go.

With weather, идти can mean:

• to be falling
• to be coming down
• to be happening

So:

• идёт снег = snow is falling / it’s snowing
• идёт дождь = rain is falling / it’s raining

This is a very natural Russian pattern, even though it sounds unusual if translated word-for-word.

Because снег is the grammatical subject of the sentence.

Russian is structured here more like:

• Snow is going/falling outside

So:

• снег = subject
• therefore it stays in the nominative singular

Even though English usually says It’s snowing, Russian does not need a dummy subject like it. Instead, snow itself is the subject.

In the present tense, Russian usually does not use a verb meaning “to be” in sentences like this.

English says:

• It is snowing

Russian says:

• идёт снег

There is no separate present-tense word for is here. This is completely normal in Russian.

So learners should get used to the fact that Russian often leaves out am / is / are in the present tense.

It can match both, depending on context.

Very literally, it is close to:

• Outside, snow is falling

But in natural English, the best translation is often:

• It’s snowing outside

So the Russian sentence is not strange or poetic; it is a normal everyday way to describe the weather.

Yes, those are possible, but На улице идёт снег is the most natural neutral version if you want to set the scene as outside first.

Word order in Russian is more flexible than in English, and changing it often changes the emphasis:

• На улице идёт снег = neutral, natural: Outside, it’s snowing
• Снег идёт на улице = puts more emphasis on snow
• Идёт снег на улице = possible, but less neutral in many contexts

So the original version is a very good standard sentence for learners.

Yes, you can, but it means something a little different.

• На улице снег = There’s snow outside / It’s snowy outside
• На улице идёт снег = It’s snowing outside

So:

• снег alone describes the condition
• идёт снег describes the action/process of snow falling now

That difference is important.

Yes, падает снег is grammatically correct and understandable, because it literally means snow is falling.

But in ordinary weather talk, идёт снег is much more idiomatic and common.

Compare:

• идёт снег = the normal everyday way to say it’s snowing
• падает снег = more literal, sometimes more descriptive or stylistic

So learners should recognize падает снег, but usually prefer идёт снег for standard speech.

идёт is pronounced roughly ee-DYOT.

Important points:

• the stress is on ё
• ё is always stressed
• ё sounds like yo

So:

• идёт = ee-DYOT
• not EE-det

In writing, Russian sometimes replaces ё with е, so you may also see идет, but the pronunciation is still идёт.

Not always. It often means outside in a general sense.

For example, if someone is inside a house and says:

• На улице холодно
• На улице идёт снег

they usually mean:

• It’s cold outside
• It’s snowing outside

So even though the literal image is on the street, the practical meaning is often simply outdoors.

A good way to break it down is:

• На улице = outside / on the street
• идёт = is falling / is coming down
• снег = snow

So the structure is:

• location + verb + subject

Russian often allows this kind of order, especially when the location or setting is introduced first.

A learner can think of it as:

• Outside, snow is falling

which naturally becomes in English:

• It’s snowing outside