Mild weather front brings unseasonably high temperatures for Christmas Eve, with some areas reaching up to 15°C

The UK is on track to enjoy one of its warmest Christmases in history, with the Met Office forecasting temperatures up to 6°C higher than usual for the season in some regions. A wave of unusually mild weather arrived just in time for Christmas Eve, and it is expected that automated weather stations across Britain will record temperatures between 13°C and 14°C, with some areas, like north-east Wales, potentially seeing 15°C.

Although Christmas Day itself is expected to be slightly cooler, the temperature will still be significantly higher than the usual 6-7°C for this time of year, bringing it closer to the warmest Christmas on record. That record was set in 1920 when a temperature of 15.6°C was recorded in Killerton, Devon.

Aidan McGivern, a meteorologist with the Met Office, commented on the warm Christmas Eve, calling it “remarkably mild,” and pointed out that such weather has become increasingly common during Christmas in the UK. While the warm front, which originates from the Atlantic, has brought a blanket of cloud over the country, breaks in the cloud will allow some sunshine to peek through. The weather pattern results from a pressure system where a low pressure area to the north generates anticlockwise winds, and a high pressure to the south creates clockwise winds.

With these unseasonably warm temperatures, the Met Office has ruled out the possibility of a white Christmas for the UK this year, marking the end of a four-year streak from 2020 to 2023 when some snow had fallen. For the Met Office to declare a white Christmas, at least one snowflake must be observed by an official observer or an automated weather station. No snow was recorded on Christmas Day in the UK in either 2018 or 2019.

The tradition of expecting a white Christmas dates back to a colder period between 1550 and 1850, when the UK and the northern hemisphere experienced a “Little Ice Age” that saw more frequent snowfalls. During some particularly cold Januaries, Londoners even held frost fairs on the River Thames, complete with football games, food stalls, and temporary pubs.

However, since the Industrial Revolution, global warming caused by greenhouse gas emissions has increased average temperatures, further diminishing the chances of a white Christmas. Nowadays, most of the UK is at the beginning of the snow season, so snow is more likely in January and February. A typical December in the UK sees an average of three days of settled snow, with that number rising to 3.3 days in January and 3.4 days in February.

Rather than a white Christmas, the Met Office predicts a grey Christmas for the UK, with mild temperatures expected to continue until Friday. After that, conditions are forecast to become more unsettled, leading into the final weekend of the year.