Earth's Warmest January Is Eighth Straight Record Month, NOAA, NASA Found

E​arth officially had its warmest January according to data from four separate agencies, the latest month in a string of records following the planet's hottest year in 2023.

New data confirmed the record. In a report released Wednesday, NOAA found January's globally averaged temperature was 2.29 degrees Fahrenheit above average. That may not sound like much, but it was slightly warmer than 2016, the previous January record in their dataset dating to 1850.

NASA's Goddard Institute for Space Studies and the Japan Meteorological Agency also found January 2024 nudged slightly above than both 2016 and 2020 in their datasets dating to the late 19th century. Earlier this month, the European Copernicus Climate Change Service (C3S) also found January was a global record-setter.

Globally averaged temperature data is synthesized from measurements taken by weather stations, ships, aircraft and satellites.

That makes eight in a row. January was the eighth straight month Earth set a new warm record for that month, a streak that started in June 2023.

That includes its two single hottest months – July and August – as well as the planet's four most anomalously warm months – September, October, November and December – according to C3S. All of those led to a record-shattering warm year in 2023.

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O​ceans are still fueling the warmth. The planet's oceans were also record-warm for any January dating to 1900. It was the 10th month in a row in which the planet's oceans were record-warm for that month.

Swaths of the eastern and tropical Atlantic Ocean, western Pacific Ocean near the International Date Line, and Indian Ocean were record-warm in January.

A​nd while not record-warm for January, the strong El Niño can also be seen on the map below as a tongue of warm water extending west from South America.

W​hen considering the oceans outside of the polar regions, C3S noted temperatures not only have set records for the time of year each day since last April, but have now shot above the previous all-time warm record set last August.

T​here were notables on land, too. Africa and South America each had their warmest January, according to NOAA. One location in northern Scotland set a new all-time January record high for the U.K.

Eastern Canada, the Middle East and central Asia were all much warmer than average in January. While the highly changeable month turned out colder than average in western Canada, Maple Creek, Saskatchewan, reached 70 degrees on Jan. 30, Canada's second-warmest January temperature on record.

Will 2​024 set a new record? Unlike last year, 2024 began with a strong El Niño already established. While that is expected to vanish, as usual, by late spring or summer, it's expected to have lagging effects.

"​The main effect of the current El Niño (on the planet's temperatures) will come in 2024," said Adam Scaife of the U.K. Met Office in a mid-January press release.

Scaife also said 2024 has "strong potential to be another record-breaking year."

The U.K. Met Office forecasts the planet's temperature to surpass the 2.7-degree Fahrenheit threshold of the 2015 Paris Climate Agreement, with the caveat that while topping that is certainly historic, the one-year spike doesn't necessarily mean the 2015 accord's threshold is breached permanently.

N​OAA calculated a 21.7% chance of a new record warm year in 2024 in their January report, a notably high chance so early in the year. One year ago, their chance of a 2023 setting that record was "less than 6.9%".

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M​ORE ON WEATHER.COM

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Jonathan Erdman is a senior meteorologist at weather.com and has been covering national and international weather since 1996. His lifelong love of meteorology began with a close encounter with a tornado as a child in Wisconsin. He completed a Bachelor's degree in physics at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, then a Master's degree working with dual-polarization radar and lightning data at Colorado State University. Extreme and bizarre weather are his favorite topics. Reach out to him on X (formerly Twitter), Threads, Facebook and Bluesky.

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