How Hot Do You Like It In Summer?

[Methuselah]

I am genuinely gobsmacked by the amount of people who would like to experience over 38C in summer!

I would only 'like' to see it because it might lead to an all-time record...Once will be enough!

[Thundery wintry showers]

Like many others, my most ideal choices from the poll would be 22-25C by day and 12-14C by night. With those temperature values, if it's reasonably sunny and not windy, a fair amount of warmth is retained into the evening and then it cools off overnight making sleeping comfortable.

However, I'm fine with temperatures in the high teens if there is a fair amount of sunshine and not much wind, and can also tolerate maximum temperatures up to around 32C (contrasting with my childhood when I struggled in anything above 25C)- hence I tend to welcome periodic heatwaves with temperatures in the range 27-32C. I find overnight minima over 17C uncomfortable for sleeping in though especially if accompanied by high humidity.

Temperatures in the mid to high 30s are good for novelty value but I would be against any sort of sustained spell with those kind of temperatures, having experienced a week of those temperatures (and a couple of days which reached 40C) during the French heatwave in August 2003. One or two individual days within a summer might be okay, but not something I would specifically hope for.

[95 Degrees]

32-36C is perfect and my ideal temperatrue, 22C upwards is fine in summer, too cold below that to really enjoy it in a t-shirt, nights of 18-24C are great, warm but it's fine, 25C+ nights are fine but need air-con to sleep because it gets too humid, I don't really have a limit to what is too hot 40C is super extreme hot but I like that suppose 55C+ it would get too much for mebut it's almost impossible to exprience outside on earth.

Edited May 23, 2012 by BrightInBrighton

[Milhouse]

I prefer regular maxes of 25-27c in the summer and a nice warm, but pleasant breeze to maintain comfort. I would like to see several days of 30c+ during the summer just say i have experienced some really hot days. If i was to choose my ideal Summer month it would have 2 seperate weeks of hot weather with a week or so of cooler conditions inbetween with temperatures around 23c

[Harve]

26c is about right for the very hottest of days, any warmer and it's no longer pleasant. If I'm wanting to do any sort of outdoor activity, though, 18-19c is the optimum. In fact, if I'm running anything between -12 and 5c is perfect: quite rare unless I'm in a sheltered valley at 4.30am (a few days before Christmas 2010, I went for a run into Dovedale at 8am knowing it was very cold but not knowing it was -18c!). The ideal cycling temperature is probably 12c.

I do like warm evenings though, at around 18c. I wish there were some mechanism that lowers temperatures into single figures past midnight.

Edited May 23, 2012 by Harve

[Bottesford]

I am genuinely gobsmacked by the amount of people who would like to experience over 38C in summer!

As many peeps keep saying - this is a weather forum so people like extremes! The extremes apply at both ends of the spectrum - an icy cold easterly can be extremely unpleasant to do things in but still people want to experience -15 or -20c none the less!

The ideal cycling temperature is probably 12c.

Nah I'd go for more like 15c-17c. No need for a jacket even on that first downhill stretch leaving my house from 'cold' but not too hot either. Not that I mind cycling in the heat anyway.

[Derp Patrol]

20-22C is nice, but with a breeze and unless there are cloudless skies (in which case it would probably be higher than 20C anyway) it can feel chilly when you are inside, and the temperature will drop more quickly in the evening making it not as comfortable to sit outside in shorts and a T shirt.

In the same way, I can understand people not liking warm nights, but people suggesting that 12-14C is hot to sleep in confuses me a bit!

[Bottesford]

In the same way, I can understand people not liking warm nights, but people suggesting that 12-14C is hot to sleep in confuses me a bit!

Depends on your house really. If you're in a modern well insulated house and you're bedroom catches all the evening sun then I imagine 12-14c @ 5am would equate to much much higher in that bedroom @ 11pm.

Conversely if you're in a poorly insulated house that keeps its cool even in hot weather and your bedroom faces east or north then you'd be fine with mins 16-18c.

I fall into the latter bracket so my house is a wonderful place to be at the moment (living room max today was 22.5c) but in cooler weather it's gas guzzling time. Sadly this means it is gas guzzling time for the majority of the year!

[reef]

Depends on your house really. If you're in a modern well insulated house and you're bedroom catches all the evening sun then I imagine 12-14c @ 5am would equate to much much higher in that bedroom @ 11pm.

Conversely if you're in a poorly insulated house that keeps its cool even in hot weather and your bedroom faces east or north then you'd be fine with mins 16-18c.

I fall into the latter bracket so my house is a wonderful place to be at the moment (living room max today was 22.5c) but in cooler weather it's gas guzzling time. Sadly this means it is gas guzzling time for the majority of the year!

This definitely has a lot to do with it. It hasnt been higher than 19.2C here today, but due to unbroken sunshine its now 25.6C upstairs. Even last night with the windows open and a min temp of 10.2C it didnt drop below 22C anywhere in the house so if the night had been 16-18C then it would have been even harder to sleep.

I can understand the argument of wanting it to remain warmer to stay outside later in a t-shirt, but for the number of times this is done compared to the number of times a good night's sleep is required for work etc then it doesnt suprise me to see 12-14C picking up more than 50% of the vote. I suspect even a <10C or 10-12C option might have proven just as popular.

On the other hand though we use less than 13000KWh of gas per year (even with Winters 2009/10 and 2010/11), so there are benefits in the other half of the year to such a house!

[cheeky_monkey]

i have experienced both great heat and mind numbing cold..+40c in Dubai and -40c in Edmonton. Both can be equally unpleasant..in the heat you cant de-robe but you can put on more layers when cold...however any breath of wind at -40c feels like you are being slapped around the face with a wire brush..the most uncomfortable i have been was in Singapore..it was unusually hot for the city +36c with very very high humidity to the point it was difficult to breath.

my preference is for warm days 25c low humidity followed by cool but not cold nights.

[phil nw.]

Of course everyone has different comfort levels wrt to warmth and i am no different.

Unless i am on a beach or by a pool with a cold drink nearby then between 21-24C with low humidity would be ideal for me.

Good for anything outdoors,in my case,golf and gardening as well as being warm enough for bbq`s and sitting outside socialising.

Something like the current spell in fact,certainly no warmer for me.

[davehsug]

We do get used to high temperatures though. I remember 1976 very well & yes it was consistently hot, but you become acclimatised after a while & adjusted your activities accordingly. Even in 2006 after a few days, you learned how to cope & deal with the heat & that was much more short lived.

[Aaron]

As many peeps keep saying - this is a weather forum so people like extremes! The extremes apply at both ends of the spectrum - an icy cold easterly can be extremely unpleasant to do things in but still people want to experience -15 or -20c none the less!

Nah I'd go for more like 15c-17c. No need for a jacket even on that first downhill stretch leaving my house from 'cold' but not too hot either. Not that I mind cycling in the heat anyway.

True, I suppose, but I've experienced -20C and 38C, the two aren't really comparable, 38C is more extreme, try -30C, something I definitely would not like to experience most winters.

[A Winter's Tale]

I would rather experience 30C that -30C, but of course the former is more likely than the latter! I prefer -15C to 30C. The reasons for this is that I can find some hot temperatures incredibly terrible to experience (depending on humidity etc). You can't sit down, have a bath, walk outside or do anything. I've experienced -15C a few times, and I much prefer it to 30C because if you wear lots of layers and move about, cover yourself up properly, it can feel quite pleasant. But with a wind, no heating and not enough layers then it wouldn't be all that pleasant an experience, but I would prefer it to some of the very humid, stuffy, burning weather that can be one of the worse experiences you can have!

But the most important thing when it comes to extremes is the well-being on eldery and vulnerable people, the economy, wildlife, industry and resources. 38C would bring you a realistic chance of many deaths to elderly people and those not used to the heat or stuck in a car, heat can also be a killer for animals. Work and travelling would become very difficult and so would resting. Forest fires are a possibility as is the possibility of drought.

With -27C, eldery and vulnerable could die, certain wildlife could die, food and plants can be damaged, damage to homes and resources are possible, heating would have to be used which would cost money, travelling and walking could be unsafe and so on. So as we all see, as much as we'd like to see extremes for the sake of extreme weather, there are far more important issues and factors that could be hit during these extremes, and we all have to bare that in mind.

[Thundery wintry showers]

We do get used to high temperatures though. I remember 1976 very well & yes it was consistently hot, but you become acclimatised after a while & adjusted your activities accordingly. Even in 2006 after a few days, you learned how to cope & deal with the heat & that was much more short lived.

It depends on the degree of heat for me. I remember that during my 2010 holiday in Provence, southern France, with daytime maxes of 30-35C and overnight min of 15-20C, I coped quite well during the first 4-5 days and then became drained by the heat (and the overnight minima were at least as large a factor as the daytime maxima). The 40-degree heat during the French August 2003 heatwave was impossible for me to remotely hope to acclimatise to.

But if we're talking daytime temperatures in the mid to high 20s and nudging the low 30s and minima in the region of 12 to 16C then I generally acclimatise quite well, which is why I had few issues with heat during July 2006. I recall struggling with the heat of August 1995 but that reflected my lower tolerance of heat back then and I doubt that heat would be a major issue for me if the synoptics were to be repeated this summer. On the other hand I might struggle with a repeat of August 1997 as that month had a strong emphasis on high minima.

[carinthian]

We often reach 32C in Austria, however in the mountains 21C is a struggle, however night time temperatures during hot spells striuggle to get below 18c , even at allitude.

C

[MP-R]

For me it's very much down to humidity. I love heat but hate humidity which is why I should enjoy Madrid. I've just come back from Madrid where it was 31C with about 15-20% humidity this afternoon to here where it's 20C with 85% humidity and here feels so much more uncomfortable - lovely for sitting outside after dark in but not great for sleeping, especially as my room faces west.

In the UK, 25C is perfect for me but a few days between 28-32C when I'm not going anywhere are also very good, not least for the records.

[cheeky_monkey]

True, I suppose, but I've experienced -20C and 38C, the two aren't really comparable, 38C is more extreme, try -30C, something I definitely would not like to experience most winters.

There is no real difference between -20c and -30c in the way it feels..at this point its just cold..if you stood outside and did not know the temp it is very difficult to guess whether its -20c or -30c.

[Essan]

The lowest I've experienced is -16c.

And the difference between -16c and +36c is if you want to spend any time outside at -16c you simply put some clothes on ....

[picog]

Far too hot for me the last few days. Max of 20C is good, even that can be too hot sometimes. It has never been too cold for me in the UK though!

[ZONE 51]

From the first question-results so far..

[ZONE 51]

22-25C generally is what people like the temperatures to be during summer, so not to cool not to hot..

Edited May 26, 2012 by ElectricSnowStorm