Pressure charts show a sequence of low pressures trundling over the UK this week. This will bring more cloud and some rain with blustery winds at times, and a hint of autumn as the evenings draw in. However there will be strangely warm and muggy air for a day or so. It is also a time for reflection on the summer of 2026, as the provisional figures are released by the UK Met Office.
Summer 2026 was provisionally the hottest on record for the UK. The season’s mean temperature was made around 130 times more likely due to human-induced climate change, changing because of the effect of burning fossil fuels.
As well as the hottest UK summer on record, England, Wales and Northern Ireland also broke their respective mean temperature records for summer. Summer is the months of June, July and August for statistical purposes. Scotland reported its joint-sixth warmest summer on record.
The five warmest UK summers on record are now: 2026, 2025, 2018, 2006 and 2003.
It was 2022 when the maximum temperature records fell, with 40.3C in Lincolnshire in July, the current UK and England record, also 37.1C for Wales and 34.8C for Scotland. The summer of 1976 sits as the seventh warmest on record, with respect to mean temperature.
This year the top temperature was 38.1°C at Kew Gardens on 13th August. Lingwood in Norfolk broke the June daily temperature record with 38.0°C. In total, 54 Met Office weather stations broke their all-time daily maximum temperature record this summer.
Whilst there has been plenty of fine and sunny summer weather, there has also been drought and lengthy heatwaves to contend with. Thunderstorms have resulted in flash flooding as the ground is baked hard, and for England and Wales, it will be remembered for that bright yellow grass. The weather is beginning to change. Yesterday, the 1st September, marked the start of meteorological autumn.
Rainfall accumulation data for 24 hours up to 0835 Weds 2nd September
As often happens in these Atlantic westerly flows, there has been wet weather in the west as eastern England stayed dry. London Heathrow saw the top temperature of 25C on Tuesday 1st as over an inch of rain fell in Highland Scotland.
Wednesday
There is some warm and humid air moving over the UK later today and tonight. Northern Scotland has seen a brighter start, but with a fresher feel to Wednesday. The main band of frontal rain will continue to edge northwards across Northern Ireland, northern England and over southern Scotland. There have already been showery outbreaks over parts of Britain ahead of this.
The warm and muggy air is following this warm front, with a south to SW breeze. Where the cloud thins and breaks, temperatures will leap up in any sunshine. Under the cloud and showery rain, around 18 to 21 but in any sunny spells 23 to 25C is possible.
It will be warm this evening and overnight, with temperatures staying around 15 to 18C.
The frontal rain will turn heavy as it moves northeastwards over Scotland. As that reaches the Northern Isles, there will be a cooler, westerly flow and temperatures in the northwestern quarter of the UK will fall to 11C with clearing skies.
Thursday
There will be a fresher westerly wind across parts of the UK, but a good deal more sunshine on Thursday. The warm and humid air will still be around in the south and southeast of the UK, and so temperatures will be in the twenties Celsius, even up to 28C in London and the Home Counties. It will feel very warm and muggy.
There will be more cloud through the English Channel linked to a trailing weather front, which could bring more murk to the south coast. So it will feel close, but it will be the sunshine that will really lift temperatures. The UKV model has a signal for a new pulse of heavy and persistent rain to head for Northern Ireland on Thursday afternoon and then push over a central swathe of Britain later in the day. The ECM and GFS models also show this surge of heavy rain, but there is some movement north/south around when it will reach north Wales or SW Scotland. Northern England, into the north Midlands, Peak District, Merseyside and north Wales should expect some heavy rain later on Thursday. It will stay dry, bright, humid and warm to the south. To the north of the frontal band there will be scattered heavy showers from the west.
Friday
The warm and humid air will be over southern Britain during Thursday night but then fade away to the SE during Friday. This change will be linked to a thinning band of rain, the cold front, which will bring some lively convection across England, reaching Kent and Sussex by midday. Brighter but fresher conditions following from the north.
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