July 2026 extended the run of exceptional global heat, but the most useful reading is not a single rank. It is the combination of hot land, record-warm seas and a strengthening El Niño that is now changing the odds of heat and rainfall extremes from one region to another.
The World Meteorological Organization's 12 August review reported that NOAA placed July in a tie with July 2024 as the warmest July in its record. The Copernicus Climate Change Service ranked it second, with average surface air temperature 1.47°C above its estimate for the 1850–1900 pre-industrial baseline. Different datasets use different methods, so small changes in ranking are expected. The shared signal is stronger: the ten warmest Julys have all occurred since 2016, and 2023 through 2026 occupy the top four places.
The oceans added another warning. NOAA and Copernicus both found the highest July sea-surface temperatures on record. Warm water covered much of the tropical Pacific, where El Niño conditions were already present, while marine heatwaves affected the Atlantic and western Mediterranean around Europe.
One global month, very different local hazards
North America, Africa and Asia each registered their warmest July in NOAA's monthly analysis. Western Europe endured its hottest June–July period on record, accompanied by dry soils and low flows on the Seine, Rhine and Danube. Those conditions affect more than comfort: they can constrain irrigation, river transport, power generation and water supply while priming landscapes for fire.
At the same time, heavy rain and flooding struck other regions. WMO highlighted monsoon flooding in Bangladesh, severe rainfall across parts of South Asia and evacuations in China after typhoons. A warm global average does not mean every location is hot or dry; it means the background energy in the climate system is higher, while circulation patterns determine where particular extremes land.
El Niño changes the forecast, not the laws of probability
WMO's seasonal outlook published on 31 July says El Niño is expected to strengthen into a strong event during August–October. It raises the likelihood of above-normal temperatures across much of the world and produces a familiar but uneven rainfall footprint—wetter in some areas, drier in others. A positive Indian Ocean Dipole is also expected to develop, adding another influence around the Indian Ocean basin.
That outlook is not a prediction that a specific flood, drought or wildfire will occur. Seasonal forecasts describe shifts in probability across broad areas. For public-health agencies, utilities, farmers and disaster managers, their value is the lead time: heat plans can be activated, reservoirs managed, disease surveillance adjusted and emergency supplies moved before a hazard is certain.
The next useful information will come from national meteorological services, which can resolve local risk more precisely than a global El Niño label. Watch updated rainfall probabilities, soil moisture, river levels and marine heat—not just the monthly temperature ranking.
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