The entire QSCAT data were re-processed by JPL ("Release 2", or "R2", based on a recalibrated model function called QSCAT-1/F13). The process was started in July 2006, and was completed by March 2007.

QSCAT-R2 data differ from the older R1 data mainly by two improvements: a more conservative rain-flagging and slightly higher wind speeds at speeds of 16m/s and higher. Compared with the previous algorithm, the new rain-flagging technique does not flag a specific rain rate, but instead, a likelihood that wind speeds or directions are perturbed by rain. As a result, fewer data are rain-flagged.

In the previous version of blended winds (version 4.0, with QSCAT-R1), rain-flagged data were only eliminated if the wind speed was less than 15m/s ("rain15"). In the new version (version 5.0, with QSCAT-R2), all rain-flagged data are eliminated. The following figure shows that R1 and R2 blended winds are very similar, when comparing the zonally averaged wind stress curl. The wind stress curl values generally do not differ more than 0.5 curl units for most latitudes.

Also compared are QSCAT-R2 (rain-flagged) with QSCAT-R1 (rain15).