Thursday 25th June 2026

Two more very hot days before the heat slowly relents. Plenty more sunshine, but maybe a thundery downpour or two mixed in.

We are escaping the extreme heat, at least in terms of daily maximum temperatures, that was previously forecast – at one point it looked like 40’C was on.

The storms on Monday afternoon/overnight were only forecast to be scattered storms, and not all models had storms breaking out. What happened was a mesoscale system – not in any model, and I think it subtly affected the wind direction for the following days, enough to stop the extreme temperatures, which really did need a “perfect” set-up.

Still, we’ve broken the UK June record, nights are unusually warm and humidity is high. It’s still quite a phenomenal air mass.

So the general set-up sees this very hot air over much of western Europe, with low pressure to the west of Portugal driving the heat – and this low will go up the west/north-west of the UK in the coming days and may bring some showers, or thunderstorms to us.

Long introduction, onto the details.

Today sees sunshine all day, maybe a little cloud later on. Very hot, reaching around 34’C – give or take. The breeze will take the edge off, but also it’s humid. Fairly clear skies overnight though a bit of cloud around at times – and a small chance of thundery showers towards dawn, say a 20% chance. Very warm, no lower than 23’C.

Any cloud from dawn showers will quickly clear on Friday to long spells of sunshine. Very hot – reaching around 34’C to 35’C, perhaps a 36’C somewhere, and still humid, if a tad less. Another warm night, down to around 21’C – a chance of some cloud/showery bits of rain – perhaps thunderstorms.

Saturday starts to see the heat degrade – still probably plenty of sunshine but there will be some cloud bubbling up, and some thunderstorms around – I’d suggest around a 50% chance of catching one or more storms, they could be at any point dawn to dusk as things stand. Around 31’C and still humid. Clear skies likely at first overnight, cloud thickening from the west later – down to around 17’C – slowly freshening up!

Sunday looks cloudier as the heat continues to be pushed east. There will likely be sunny spells at times, and occasional bits of rain – perhaps a heavy shower along the way at some point. Around 24’C – very much give and take, less humid too, but still on the humid side. Reasonably clear skies overnight and much fresher air spreading across – down to around 13’C.

By Monday we see high pressure building from the south-west, and fresher air over the country.

Broadly speaking sunny spells or hazy sunshine, some fair-weather cloud around and very warm, around 24’C. Probably cloudier overnight, some light rain possible.

Details sketchier from here, but it will stay very warm or quite hot through Tuesday to Thursday – roughly in the range of 23’C to 28’C, and varying depending on weather conditions.

Likely there will be some weak weather fronts around bringing some cloud and patchy rain at some points – but more of the time it will be sunny and very pleasant – and without the very hot conditions of this week.

Probably this kind of set-up lasts into next weekend too, often sunny but sometimes cloudy with patchy rain, and very warm/quite hot.

However, there will be a small chance of the heat returning. Though I think that’s perhaps more likely in the second two-thirds of July than the first third.

Enjoy the heat if you can, and the fresher conditions when they are (I suspect more people are in the latter!).

Next forecast will probably be Monday morning as I have to do dutiful son duties this weekend…if the trains up north are running, of course. If I get time, and there is clarity over thunderstorm chances I will update, but I don’t know if/when I’ll have time!