January 2020

Surface air temperature anomaly for January 2020 relative to the January average for the period 1981-2010. Data source: ERA5.

Temperatures in January 2020 were above the 1981-2010 average over most of Europe. They were exceptionally high for the time of year in the north and east, in a band spreading eastward and south-eastward from Norway to Russia, with values more than 6ºC above average in many places. Norway experienced its warmest January day on record early in the month, and the month was the second warmest since 1900 for the country as a whole.

Skiers and reindeer herders were among those affected by mild conditions in Sweden. Observing stations in central and southern Finland recorded their warmest January in the period since at least 1961.

Temperatures were on average a little below normal over the Carpathian Basin and in several parts of southern Europe. Rather unusually for recent years, they were also below normal over parts of the Svalbard archipelago and over the Barents Sea to the east, where sea-ice extent was close to its 1981-2010 average. Warm than average temperatures east of Greenland extending to the north-west of Svalbard coincide with below-average sea-ice cover there.

Exceptional above-average temperatures were not confined to Europe, but extended over almost all of Russia. Temperatures were also much above average over most of the USA and eastern Canada, over Japan and parts of eastern China and Southeast Asia, over the state of New South Wales in Australia and over parts of Antarctica.

Temperatures were substantially below average over Alaska and north-western Canada, and over Baffin and Ellesmere Islands in north-eastern Canada. It was also colder than average, but to a lesser degree, over several other regions.

Although regions of below-average temperature occurred over all major oceans, particularly in the southern hemisphere, air temperatures over sea were predominantly higher than the 1981-2010 average. Global means of the marine air temperature and underlying sea surface temperature were both close to the respective peak values that occurred at the time of the 2015/16 El Niño.

Monthly global-mean and European-mean surface air temperature anomalies relative to 1981-2010, from January 1979 to January 2020. The darker coloured bars denote the January values. Data source: ERA5.

Global temperatures were substantially above average in January 2020. The month was:

• 0.77°C warmer than the average January from 1981-2010, becoming by a narrow margin the warmest January in this data record;
• warmer by 0.03°C than January 2016, which was previously the warmest January;
• close to 0.2°C warmer than January 2017, which is now the third warmest January;
• exceeded in anomalous warmth only by February and March 2016.

European-average temperature anomalies are generally larger and more variable than global anomalies, especially in winter, when they can change by several degrees from one month to the next. The European-average temperature for January 2020 was particularly high. The month was:

• 3.1°C warmer than the average January in the period 1981-2010;
• warmer than any other January in this data record, by about 0.2ºC in the case of January 2007, the previous warmest January.

The last 12 months - February 2019 to January 2020

Surface air temperature anomaly for February 2019 to January 2020 relative to the average for 1981-2010. Data source: ERA5.

Temperatures averaged over the twelve-month period from February 2019 to January 2020 were:

• well above the 1981-2010 average over and near Alaska, over the far northeast of Canada, and over central parts of northern Siberia;
• above average over almost all of Europe, more so in the east;
• also much above average over southern Africa, Australia and some parts of the Antarctic;
• above average over most other areas of land and ocean;
• below average over some land and oceanic areas, most notably over a central part of North America.

12 month global temperature anomaly

Running twelve-month averages of global-mean and European-mean surface air temperature anomalies relative to 1981-2010, based on monthly values from January 1979 to January 2020. The darker coloured bars are the averages for each of the calendar years from 1979 to 2019. Data source: ERA5.

Averaging over twelve-month periods smooths out shorter-term variations in regional- and global-average temperatures. Globally, the twelve-month period from February 2019 to January 2020 was 0.62°C warmer than the 1981-2010 average. The warmest twelve-month period was from October 2015 to September 2016, with a temperature 0.66°C above average. 2016 is the warmest calendar year on record, with a global temperature 0.63°C above that for 1981-2010. 2019 is the second warmest calendar year in this data record, with a temperature 0.59°C above average.

0.63°C should be added to these values to relate recent global temperatures to the pre-industrial level defined in the IPCC Special Report on “Global Warming of 1.5°C”. The average temperature for the twelve months to January 2020 is around 1.25°C above the level. The average for January 2020 alone is about 1.4°C above the level. The only month whose average temperature reached more than 1.5°C above the level is February 2016.

The spread in the global averages from various temperature datasets has been relatively large over the past three years. During this period the twelve-month-average temperatures, relative to 1981-2010, presented here are higher than those from five other datasets, by between 0.03°C and 0.14°C, with median 0.06°C, for the year 2019. This is due partly to differences in the extent to which datasets represent the relatively warm conditions that have predominated over the Arctic and the seas around Antarctica. Differences in estimates both of sea-surface temperature elsewhere and of temperatures over land outside the Arctic have been further factors. There is nevertheless general agreement between the datasets regarding:

• the exceptional warmth of 2016, and the warmth also of 2015, 2017, 2018 and especially 2019;
• the general increase in global temperature at an average rate close to 0.2°C per decade since the late 1970s;
• the sustained period of above-average temperatures from 2002 onwards.

There is more variability in average European temperatures, but values are less uncertain because observational coverage of the continent is relatively dense. Twelve-month averages for Europe were at a high level from 2014 to 2016. They then fell, but remained 0.5°C or more above the 1981-2010 average.

Twelve-month averages have subsequently risen again. The latest average, to January 2020, is more than 1.5°C above the 1981-2010 norm, marginally higher than that of the warmest such period previously on record, from April 2018 to March 2019. 2019 was the warmest calendar year on record for Europe as a whole.

The average surface air temperature analysis homepage explains more about the production and reliability of the values presented here.

https://www.windy.com/-Temperature-temp?temp,33.358,-32.520,3,internal

The Copernicus Climate Change Service (C3S) announces today that 2019 was the fifth in a series of exceptionally warm years and the second warmest year globally ever recorded.

Meanwhile, Europe saw its warmest year on record by a small margin. Together with the Copernicus Atmosphere Monitoring Service (CAMS), C3S also reports that CO2 concentrations in the atmosphere have continued to rise. Their data provide the first complete, global picture of 2019 temperatures and CO2 levels.

The results are in line with previous projections from WMO and the Global Carbon Project (GCP) for 2019. The WMO estimated that 2019 was likely to be the 2nd or 3rd warmest year on record, while both WMO and the GCP indicated that atmospheric CO2 concentrations had continued to increase.

C3S and CAMS are both implemented by the European Centre for Medium-Range Weather Forecasts on behalf of the European Union. The services provide quality-assured data on 2019 temperatures and CO2 concentrations, among many other climate variables. This helps policy makers, organisations, and individuals make informed choices about climate change mitigation and the quality of the air we breathe.

The temperature dataset provided by C3S shows that the global average surface air temperature was 0.04 °C lower than in 2016, the warmest year on record.

The data also show that:

The five warmest years on record have all occurred in the last 5 years, with 2019 coming in as the second warmest and 2010-2019 being the warmest decade on record.

• 2019 was almost 0.6 °C warmer than the 1981-2010 average
• The average temperature of the last 5 years was between 1.1 and 1.2 °C higher than the pre-industrial level defined by the IPCC
• Europe saw its warmest calendar year on record, marginally ahead of 2014, 2015 and 2018

Furthermore, according to satellite measurements of global atmospheric CO2 concentrations:

• CO2 continued to rise in 2019, increasing by 2.3 ± 0.8 ppm

The most pronounced warming compared to the 1981-2010 average occurred in Alaska and over other large parts of the Arctic. Most land areas were warmer than average, especially eastern and southern Europe, southern Africa and Australia. In contrast, central and south-eastern Canada experienced below average annual temperatures.

In Europe all seasons were warmer than usual, with the summer and autumn being the fourth warmest on record. None of the seasons was record-breaking in terms of average temperature, but Europe nevertheless saw its warmest calendar year on record, marginally ahead of 2014, 2015 and 2018. A more detailed analysis of the climate in Europe will be presented by Copernicus in its European State of the Climate 2019, which is set to be released in April.

Running 60-month averages of global air temperature at a height of two metres (left-hand axis) and estimated change since the pre-industrial period (right-hand axis) according to different datasets: ERA5 (ECMWF Copernicus Climate Change Service, C3S); GISTEMPv4 (NASA); HadCRUT4 (Met Office Hadley Centre); NOAAGlobalTempv5 (NOAA), JRA-55 (JMA); and Berkeley Earth.

“2019 has been another exceptionally warm year, in fact the second warmest globally in our dataset, with many of the individual months breaking records”, says Carlo Buontempo, Head of the Copernicus Climate Change Service (C3S). “The C3S temperature dataset for 2019 is the first complete set to be published including annual anomalies and globally averaged fields. This is possible because we are an operational programme, processing millions of land, marine, airborne and satellite observations daily. A state-of-the-art computer model is used to bring all these observations together, in a similar way to how weather forecasting is carried out.”

Jean-Noël Thépaut, Director of ECMWF Copernicus comments: “The past five years have been the five warmest on record; the last decade has been the warmest on record: These are unquestionably alarming signs. Seeing one or more months much warmer than the recent reference period can be disconcerting but does not as such represent a climate trend, as monthly temperature deviations vary, and some regions may show below average conditions for a while. We produce data with full global coverage of temperature every day and publish monthly and annual summaries based on this dataset that currently goes back to 1979. For determining possible long-term trends related to climate change, observations dating long into the past are invaluable. Therefore, we also compare our data with climate data dating back to the pre-industrial era to ascertain these long-term climate trends.”

Using the advantages of reanalysis

To produce its quality-assured data, C3S and CAMS use reanalysis, a scientific method which aims to estimate weather conditions and atmospheric composition for each and every day over the past few decades as accurately as possible, based on a multitude of observations.

These observations come from a variety of platforms or instruments, from weather stations to weather balloons and satellites. Taken by themselves, they provide an incomplete view of the atmosphere, as each type of observation only measures one particular aspect of the weather or atmospheric composition, such as temperature, wind or humidity etc. Also, the observations are unevenly distributed around the globe and their number tends to decrease as we go back in time.

The process of reanalysis then combines all distinct observations available on a given day and creates a complete 3D picture of conditions all around the world, for each hour of the day. Once stitched together, these pictures of global weather conditions and atmospheric composition provide a comprehensive historical record of the Earth’s climate that can be used to monitor how fast it is changing.

CO2 concentrations continue to increase

The analysis of satellite data indicates that carbon dioxide concentrations have continued to rise in recent years, including in 2019. Satellite-derived CO2 concentrations are representative of the column-averaged CO2 mixing ratio, also denoted XCO2. The dataset is a combination of two datasets that were generated for C3S and CAMS.

The estimated annual mean XCO2 growth rate for 2019 is 2.3 ± 0.8 ppm/year. This is larger than the growth rate in 2018, which was 2.1 ± 0.5 ppm/year, but less than the 2.9 ± 0.3 ppm/year in 2015. 2015 was a year with a strong El Niño climate event, which resulted in a larger atmospheric growth rate due to a weaker than normal uptake of atmospheric CO2 by the terrestrial vegetation, and large CO2 emissions from wildfires, for example in Indonesia.

Monthly global CO2 concentrations from satellites, column-averaged CO2 (XCO2), for 2003-2019. The listed numerical values in red indicate annual averages. Based on the C3S/Obs4MIPs(v4.1) consolidated (2003-2018) and CAMS preliminary near-real time data (2019) records. Source: University of Bremen for Copernicus Climate Change Service(C3S) and Copernicus Atmosphere Monitoring Service (CAMS) implemented by ECMWF

Regular climate monitoring

Every year, C3S provides a detailed look at the climate of our continent in its European State of the Climate report. In the report, more climate variables and specific climate events of the past year will be analysed. The European State of the Climate 2019 will be announced in spring 2020.

In addition to the annual temperature values, C3S routinely publishes climate bulletins at the beginning of each month, reporting on anomalies in surface air temperature, sea ice cover and hydrological variables. The latest climate bulletin for the month of December is now available, with the following findings for surface air temperature.

December 2019 surface air temperature:

• Global temperatures were on a par with December 2015, making these two months jointly the warmest Decembers in the data record
• December 2019 was more than 0.7°C warmer than the December average for 1981-2010
• The average temperature over Europe was 3.2°C warmer than that of the standard reference period (1981-2010), making it the warmest December on record for Europe by a narrow margin

More information and high-resolution graphics for December 2019 can be downloaded here: climate.copernicus.eu/climate-bulletins

About the data - Temperatures

The map and quoted data values are from ECMWF Copernicus Climate Change Service’s ERA5 dataset. Area averages for temperature over the European region are for land only with the following longitude/latitude bounds: 25W-40E, 34N-72N.

The graph is based on ERA5 and five other datasets: JRA-55 produced by the Japan Meteorological Agency (JMA), GISTEMP (version4) produced by the US National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA), HadCRUT4 produced by the Met Office Hadley Centre in collaboration with the Climatic Research Unit of the University of East Anglia, NOAAGlobalTemp (version5) produced by the US National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) and Berkeley Earth’s “recommended” version of their monthly land + ocean temperature dataset.

The ERA5 and JRA-55 datasets run to the end of 2019; the other datasets are currently available only to the end of November 2019. The data have been accessed and processed largely as described in a peer-reviewed publication (doi: 10.1002/qj.2949).

Each dataset shown in the graph is aligned to have the same average temperature for 1981–2010 as ERA5. For JRA-55 this entails a temperature reduction of 0.1°C. The other datasets are originally defined only as values relative to reference periods. HadCRUT4 is an ensemble of 100 possible realisations.

The median and range of the ensemble are plotted. The ensemble does not sample the uncertainty associated with limited geographical coverage, which is substantial for the earliest decades.

1981–2010 is the latest 30-year reference period defined by the WMO for calculating climatological averages. It is the first such period for which satellite observations of key variables including sea-surface temperature and sea-ice cover are available to support globally complete meteorological reanalyses such as ERA5.

The climatological average temperature for the pre-industrial period is taken to be 0.63°C lower than the average for 1981–2010. This follows what is suggested in the IPCC ‘Global warming of 1.5°C’ report, which estimates the increase from the pre-industrial (defined as 1850-1900) to the 20-year period 1986-2005 to be “0.63°C (±0.06°C 5–95% range based on observational uncertainties alone)”.

The annual mean temperature difference between the periods 1981-2010 and 1986-2005 is non-significant for all datasets presented here (-0.009°C to +0.004°C).

There is good general agreement among datasets concerning the substantial increase in global temperatures over the last four decades, and more uncertainty concerning changes over earlier, less well observed decades.

The spread in the global averages from the various datasets has also been relatively large over the past three years. During this period twelve-month-average temperatures relative to 1981-2010 from ERA5 are generally higher than those from the five other datasets, by between 0.03°C and 0.14°C for the latest twelve months (to November 2019) for which comparisons can be made.

This is due partly to differences in the extent to which datasets represent the relatively warm conditions that have predominated over the Arctic and the seas around Antarctica, but differences in estimates both of sea-surface temperature elsewhere and of temperature over land outside the Arctic have been further factors.

The ERA5 dataset differs from other datasets in that it has a cooling trend to the north and north-east of Greenland. This trend is associated with positive (warm) wintertime temperature anomalies in the first ten or so years of the 1981-2010 reference period, which are not seen in other estimates for this region.

These anomalous temperatures may be linked with questionably low values of the fractional sea-ice cover specified in ERA5 at that time. As a result, negative (cold) anomalies in the annual average over this region must be viewed with caution.

About the data - Carbon dioxide concentrations

We present a timeseries of monthly global averages of atmospheric carbon dioxide (CO2) derived from satellite sensors. Satellite-derived CO2 concentrations are representative of the column-averaged CO2 mixing ratio, also denoted XCO2.

The annual averages given in the graph are derived by computing the average of the monthly values.

Because higher atmospheric layers, such as the stratosphere, typically contain less CO2, the XCO2 values are usually somewhat lower than CO2 concentrations measured near the Earth’s surface. This is why satellite XCO2 values are similar, but not exactly identical to estimates based on surface observations, which are the basis of reporting by WMO and the Global Carbon Project (GCP).

The data for 2003-2018 is the consolidated product of “C3S XCO2 data derived from satellite sensors”, produced by the Copernicus Climate Change Service. The high quality C3S climate data record has been generated by merging an ensemble of individual satellite datasets from the satellite instruments SCIAMACHY/ENVISAT, TANSO-FTS/GOSAT and NASA’s OCO-2 mission, using products generated by C3S and ESA GHG-CCI in Europe, NASA in the USA and NIES in Japan.

This merged product, which is in the Obs4MIPs format (see Obs4MIPs website), is extended each year by one additional year and year 2019 data will be available end of 2020. For details see Reuter et al., 2019.

The data for 2019 is the near-real time preliminary product of “CAMS XCO2 data derived from satellite sensors”, produced by the Copernicus Atmosphere Monitoring Service. This data product has been generated from TANSO-FTS/GOSAT. For details see Heymann et al., 2015.

The XCO2 growth rates have been computed using the method of Buchwitz et al., 2018.

https://www.windy.com/-Temperature-temp?temp,31.803,-53.350,3,internal

Arctic

1 month Arctic sea ice anomalies for September 2019

The average Arctic sea ice extent in September 2019 was 4.2 million km2, that is 2.4 million km2 (or 36%) below the 1981-2010 average for September. The value for September 2019 is the third lowest in our dataset (which starts in 1979), with the lowest and second-lowest September sea ice extent dating back to 2012 and 2007, respectively. September is usually the month with the monthly minimum Arctic sea ice extent.

September 2019 Arctic Sea Ice Concentration Map

The map of sea ice concentration anomalies for the Arctic region for September 2019 shows much lower than average sea ice conditions across large sectors of the Arctic ocean, in particular in areas stretching from the Beaufort Sea via the Chukchi, East and West Siberian Seas towards Svalbard. There were very few areas with above average cover.

Antarctic

1 month Antarctic sea ice Sept 2019

Antarctic sea ice extent reached 18.2 million km2 on average in September 2019, which was 0.2 million km2 (or about 0.9%) below the 1981-2010 average for September. Even though many of the months leading up to September 2019 have shown large negative sea ice anomalies overall, the September 2019 sea ice extent is relatively close to average, ranking 15th lowest in our 41-year record. September is usually the month when Antarctic sea ice cover reaches its annual maximum extent. As such, if September is indeed the maximum also for 2019, it will be the 16th lowest monthly extent.

1 month map Antarctic sea ice for September 2019

The map of sea ice concentration anomalies for the Antarctic region in September 2019 reveals widespread areas of positive anomalies near the sea ice edge in broad sectors of the Southern Ocean, including most of the South Atlantic sector (40°W-10°W and 10°E-45°E) and of the Australian sector (80°E-180°E) . The region with the largest negative anomalies was in the South Pacific and included the northern portions of the Ross Sea and Amundsen Sea (180°W-90°W).

Monthly sea ice area for 1979-2019

1 month polar sea ice anomalies for September 2019

Variability and multidecadal trends in the areas of Arctic and Antarctic sea ice are evident in time series of monthly anomalies relative to average 1981-2010 values. The principal feature for the Arctic is a downward trend that is prominent after the year 2000. The largest negative trends have occurred in summer and autumn in recent years, but the last few years have also seen relatively low sea-ice area late in the winter, when sea-ice area reaches its annual maximum.

Variability rather than trend predominates for the Antarctic. Episodes of markedly above-average sea-ice area occurred in 2007-2009 and 2013-2015. Conversely, Antarctic sea-ice area has been substantially below average for the past three years. Anomalies in November and December 2016 were more negative than for any month in the period from 1979.

12 month range of polar sea ice area for September 2019

An alternative view is provided by graphs of minimum and maximum monthly average sea-ice area for each year. Declining sea-ice area is evident for the Arctic in both minimum and maximum annual values. Variability is again seen to predominate for the Antarctic, where record or near-record low and high annual minima and maxima occur within a few years of each other.

March is usually the month for which the average Arctic sea-ice area is a maximum, although in some years February is the month with the largest area. September is usually the month with the lowest average Arctic sea-ice area, but sometimes it is lower in August.

February has been invariably the month with the lowest average Antarctic sea-ice area in this data record. September is usually the month with the largest average Antarctic sea-ice area. However, the maximum has occurred in October and August on two occasions.

The lowest areas for the Arctic and Antarctic minima occurred in September 2012 and February 2018 respectively. The lowest areas for Arctic and Antarctic maxima occurred in February 2015 and September 1990 respectively.

The sea-ice analysis page explains more about the nature, production and reliability of the data and information presented here.

https://www.windy.com/-Ozone-layer-gtco3?gtco3,49.554,173.320,3,internal

Regions with most markedly above average temperatures include central and eastern USA, the Mongolian plateau and parts of the Arctic. Much below average temperatures were only recorded in a few regions, including southwestern Russia and parts of Antarctica.

Temperatures over Europe for September 2019 were above the 1981-2010 average over most of the continent, especially in the south and south-east. Below-average temperatures occurred over much of Norway and Sweden, and over the far east of the continent.

Elsewhere, temperatures over the northern hemispheric land masses were markedly above average over parts of the Arctic, over most of the USA, and over Iran, Afghanistan, Mongolia and northern China. Temperatures were likewise above average over central South America, South Africa, south-western Australia and West Antarctica.

Temperatures over land were notably below average only over south-western Russia, the Central Asian Republics and parts of Antarctica, although several other regions experienced temperatures that were slightly below average for the month.

Although regions of below-average temperature occurred over all major oceans, including the tropical eastern Pacific, marine air temperatures were predominantly higher than average, especially so over the north-eastern Pacific Ocean and over several Arctic and West Antarctic seas.

Mean temperature anomalies September 2019

Temperatures averaged over the twelve-month period from August 2018 to July 2019 were:

• much above the 1981-2010 average over most of the Arctic, peaking over and near Alaska;
• above average over almost all of Europe;
• above average over other areas of land and ocean, especially so over central northern Siberia, north-eastern China, the Middle East, south-east Asia, Australia, central and southern Africa and some parts of the Antarctic;
• below average over several land and oceanic areas, including much of Canada, parts of the North Atlantic and South Pacific, and to the south-west of Australia.
  Monthly global-mean and European-mean surface air temperature anomalies relative to 1981-2010

Global temperatures were substantially above average in September 2019. The month as a whole was:

• 0.57°C warmer than the average September from 1981-2010, making it by a narrow margin the warmest September in this data record;
• 0.02°C warmer than September 2016, the second warmest September;
• 0.1°C warmer than September 2017, the third warmest September.

European-average temperature anomalies are generally larger and more variable than global anomalies, especially in winter, when they can change by several degrees from one month to the next. The European-average temperature for September 2019 was:

• 0.7°C warmer than the average September from 1981-2010;
• not remarkably warm in the context of values over the past two decades.

The last 12 months temperature anomaly map - October 2018 to September 2019

Temperatures averaged over the twelve-month period from October 2018 to September 2019 were:

• much above the 1981-2010 average over most of the Arctic, peaking over and near Alaska and over the central parts of northern Siberia;
• above average over almost all of Europe;
• above average over most other areas of land and ocean, especially so over north-eastern China, the Middle East, south-east Asia, Australia, southern Africa and some parts of the Antarctic;
• below average over several land and oceanic areas, most notably over much of Canada and one sector of Antarctica.

12 month global temperature anomaly

Averaging over twelve-month periods smooths out the shorter-term variations. Globally, the twelve-month period from October 2018 to September 2019 was 0.55°C warmer than the 1981-2010 average.

The warmest twelve-month period was from October 2015 to September 2016, with a temperature 0.66°C above average. 2016 is the warmest calendar year on record, with a global temperature 0.63°C above that for 1981-2010.

The second warmest calendar year, 2017, had a temperature 0.54°C above average, while the third warmest year, 2018, was 0.46°C above the 1981-2010 average.

0.63°C should be added to these values to relate recent global temperatures to the pre-industrial level defined in the IPCC Special Report on “Global Warming of 1.5°C”. Monthly temperatures over the past twelve months have averaged close to 1.2°C above this pre-industrial level. The September temperature is 1.2°C above the level.

The spread in the global averages from various temperature datasets has been unusually large over the past three years. During this period the twelve-month average values presented here are higher than those from several independent datasets, by between 0.05°C and 0.15°C for the twelve months for which spread is largest.

This is due partly to differences in the extent to which datasets represent the relatively warm conditions that have predominated over the Arctic and the seas around Antarctica.

Differences in estimates both of sea-surface temperature elsewhere and of temperatures over land outside the Arctic have been further factors.

There is nevertheless general agreement between datasets regarding:

• the exceptional warmth of 2016, and the warmth also of 2015, 2017, 2018 and 2019;
• the overall average rate of warming of around 0.18°C per decade since the late 1970s;
• the sustained period of above-average temperatures from 2001 onwards.

There is more variability in average European temperatures, but values are less uncertain because observational coverage of the continent is relatively dense.

Twelve-month averages for Europe were at a high level from 2014 to 2016. They then fell, but remained 0.5°C or more above the 1981-2010 average. Twelve-month averages have risen since then, but have again fallen in recent months.

The latest average, for the period from October 2018 to September 2019, is 1.1°C above the 1981-2010 norm. The warmest such period, from April 2018 to March 2019, was 1.5°C above average.

The average surface air temperature analysis homepage explains more about the production and reliability of the values presented here.

https://www.windy.com/-Temperature-temp?temp,25.562,-31.641,3,internal