Nigel Marriott's Blog

An independent statistician using data to understand our world and to predict the future

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UK Weather Tracker #112 – May 2026

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May 2026 was the 3rd warmest on record across the UK.  I have to take this on trust as I spent most of the second half of May abroad and missed the warmest spring on record in the South West!  However, like last month, my abnormality index was not impressed and rated the month as entirely normal.

The Latest Month’s Weather in 8 Charts

The meteorological year starts in December which is why December appears as the 1st data point in the charts below.  All data is supplied by the Met Office and can be found here.  The dashboard below shows charts for 7 weather variables and a summary index as a single graphic.  The middle bottom block explains why some data points are in black, points out the charts for Sunshine & Frost are swapped around according to the seasons and how the abnormality index (see next section) is calculated.

In July 2025, the Met Office extended their historical frost days data back to 1931.

How abnormal was May 2026?

Chart H displays my UK Weather Abnormality Index (see my May 2019 post for details).  The closer to zero this index is, the less abnormal and thus more “average” a month is.  The higher it is, the more abnormal the month is.  When the index is over 100%, we can describe the month as unusual in some way.

The abnormality index was 53% this month which is in line with the median.

Regional Variations – Spring 2026

May marks the end of the meteorological spring.  I do not track regional statistics every month but I do track temperature by season for each region so I can update the regional temperature chart here.

This shows the Z-Score for each region for the 2026 spring.  A Z-Score is simply the regional temperature minus the long term average for that region divided by the long term standard deviation for that region.  Doing this, gets around the issue of each region being different on average whereas z-scores all have the same scale, namely number of standard deviations above or below the long term average.

The 2026 spring was the 3rd warmest on record nationwide.  Relative to their long term averages, nearly all regions of England experienced their warmest ever springs whereas Scotland & Northern Ireland varies between their 4th & 12th warmest springs.  For more details about the 2026 spring. click on the link provided in the list below.

PS: If you bookmark this link, it will be refreshed with the latest month’s data.  I usually post the update in the first week of each month.

Click the relevant month below to see what the weather was back then.  Months highlighted in bold had an abnormality index exceeding 100% indicating unusual weather.  Alternatively click the Weather Tracker hash tag below this post to see a list of all such posts.

For analysis of trends by seasons, please click on the relevant season from this list or the Weather Trends hashtag below this post.

For analysis of trends by year, please click on the relevant year from this list –

 

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