2025 Year-In-Review: Part 1 - Temperatures

And now, what you've all been waiting for! It's time for our big look back at 2025 with our Year-in-Review Part 1 - Temperatures.



Warmest & Coldest Years

The big news: 2025 is Edmonton's 7 warmest year on record at 2.2°C above the 20th century average. 

That's a bit above 10th place 2024, but below 1st place 2023.

Warm months were Jan (#13), May (#6), Aug (#5) & Sep (warmest on record). Feb & Dec were below average.

At the end of November 2025 was 5th warmest, but the cold December pushed it down to 7.

The average High was also our 7th warmest, while the average Low was 14th warmest. But together that makes 2025 #7.

You can see where the red line dips for February & December.

I only get to use this chart once a year, and here each month of the year gets a pie piece.

In 2025 February & December were colder than the 20th century average, so they get the blue trivial pursuit pieces. The other months get various shades of orange.

For the climate stripes scarf chart 2025's 2.2°C is another red one, although obviously not as red as the record-breaking 2023.

The last time that we had a blue stripe was back in 1996, at -1.7°C colder than the 20th century average.

For the local outlying stations 2025's temperatures ranked #8 for the airport, #13 for Stony Plain, and Campsie was just #26.



Temperatures Across Canada

Across the country 2025 was Kelowna's #1 warmest on record.

Dawson City, Edmonton, Calgary & St. John's were top-10.

The other cities mostly fell in the range of top 15-35. But Quebec City was lowest with 2025 as its 56th warmest year.

Here are the climate stripes for the country's big cities. 

Back in 2022 we had a few whites and one blue (Winnipeg), but 2023, 2024 & 2025 have been all pink or red. Quebec City is the least pink of the bunch.

Kelowna's previous hottest year had been 1958, at 2.3°C warmer than their 20th century average. 2024's 2.2°C came close to catching it. But 2025 succeeded, at 2.6°C warmer.

Aug & Sep were their warmest on record, and 6 other months were top-10.



Warm & Cold Months

Across the country February & December were below-average for most of the country.

All of the other month were pretty unanimously above average, with a few little blips of blue, like July in Saskatchewan, and November in Ontario.



High Temperatures

For 2025 Edmonton had 230 days with Highs above our 30-year average. That included 8 warmest-records in February, May, 4 in August, and 2 in September.

2025 had 115 Highs reach 20°C. That's the 6th most on record. Recently 2022 had 119 and 2023 had 121. 1897 & 1898 share the record with 122.

2025 had 56 Highs reach 25°C, which is the 5th most on record, and the most since 1961. 1898 has the record with 64.

2025 had 14 Highs reach 30°C. That ties 1961 for 3rd most on record. The only years with more are 2024's 16 and 2021's 17.

We got a late heatwave at the end of August, which wasn't as exciting as some of the big peak-of-summer heatwaves that we've seen recently. But for as late in the year as it was, it set a bunch of new records. We talked about it more here: https://edmontonweathernerdery.blogspot.com/2025/02/the-great-deepfreezeish-of-february-2025.html

 

The August heatwave had: 6 30°C Highs in-a-row, which doubled the record for that late in the year, and missed the overall record by 1. 

4 32°C Highs in-a-row which tied the overall record. Set 4 new daily record Highs in-a-row.

For 30°C days across the country Edmonton & Kelowna, Montréal & Moncton were top-10.

And even though Edmonton got a lot, Calgary & Saskatoon were both well below average.



Low Temperatures

For 2025 there were 214 days with above-average Lows, including 6 new warmest-records in January, Feburary & August. 

The 151 below-average Lows were spread around, but included lengthy February & December deepfreezes, and a few cool weeks in July.

2025 ended up with 31 Lows of -20°C, when our average is around 25. Most of those came from February (13) and December (13).

19 of those got to -25°C, which tied 2019. Our average is around a dozen.

2025 only had 1 Low reach -30°C, when we average around 4. The only -30°C was -30.3°C on February 18th. For as cold as December felt, it "only" got down to -29.5°C.

2025 had two deepfreezes, in February & December. They were both long, but they weren't as long, or as cold as some of the more epic deepfreezes we got from 2018~2024.

We looked at them in more detail here:

https://edmontonweathernerdery.blogspot.com/2025/02/the-great-deepfreezeish-of-february-2025.html

For -20°C Lows across the country 2025 was pretty typical for the big winter cities.



Warm Winter Days

In the deep-winter months of January, February & December we average around 35 above-freezing Highs (about 40% of the winter). 

2025 had long coldsnaps in February & December, and ended up with 34 of them.

That included 16 5°C Highs, which is right on average.



Yearly Extremes

With a warmest High of 33.3°C and a coldest Low of -30.3°C Edmonton's temperature range in 2025 was 63.6°C. That's pretty typical for modern years. 

2024, 2021 & 2020 were all around 70°C because they got hotter heatwaves and colder deepfreezes.



Records

2025 set 8 new record Highs. That's down from 2024's 11, but it ties 1934 for the 4th most record Highs.

And it set 6 new record warmest-Lows. That's pretty average, and down from 2021-2024 which all set 10 or more.



Frost-Free Days

2025's final spring frost was pretty late on May 5th, while the first fall frost was just a bit late on October 4th.

So 2025 ends up with 140 frost-free days, which is a bit below the average of 146.

2024 had 174, 2023 was up at 182, and 1980 has the record at 184.

This chart is very cramped, but it gives a sense of how the growing season varies across the country.

In 2025 most cities were pretty average, but the prairie cities (except Edmonton) were all around 2 weeks longer than average.



Edmonton versus Calgary

And finally, a quick comparison of Edmonton & Calgary. The temperatures usually track fairly closely, although Calgary is warmer.

But something happened in December. It was a really cold month in Edmonton and across the prairies, but Calgary lucked out with just a bit below average.

That's the end of Part 1 of our 2025 Year-in-Review. Part 2 will look at precipitation, and part 3 will be all about snow.

September 2020 Review / October 2020 Preview

I think most people would agree that September 2020 was a pretty nice September in Edmonton, but just how nice was it?

High Temperatures

At the start of September our average daily High is 21°C, and over the course of the month things get cooler, and by the end of September the average High is 14°C. For September 2020 overall 23 days were warmer than the average, and 7 were colder. 

The end of the month seemed pretty warm, but in reality the High temperatures were only a little bit above the 30-year average, and they did not come anywhere close to the top of the range. But on the other hand, we also didn't have any really cold days down at the bottom of the range - which we did have in 2017, 2018 & 2019 (especially in 2018).

 

Looking at the numbers, September 2020 had a total of 15 days which hit 20°C, which is above the average of 10 days. That included one day which hit 25°C, with a High of 27°C on September 10th. On average September has 3 days hit 25°C, so we were actually a bit low this year.

September 2020 didn't record any Highs below 10°C though. That's a change compared to 2019 which had 4 Highs below 10°C (including 2 below 5°C), or 2018 which had 15(!) High below 10°C (including 7 below 5°C). The last September that didn't have any High below 10°C was 2016, and including 2020 that has only happened 8 times since 2000.

Low Temperatures

For the Low temperatures for the month 22 days were warmer than average and 8 were cooler. And similar to the Highs, the Lows were generally pretty far from the top or bottom of the range, although September 1st, 11th & 20th all came within about 0.5°C of the 30-year warmest Low.

Blatchford did not record any frosts in September 2020, although it came close on September 16th at 0.4°C. Most of the outlying stations did have at least one frost though, and the Airport had 3: on the 15th, 16th & 30th. The Blatchford station makes it through September without a frost about half of the time.

Warm & Cold Months

September 2020's average High of 18.7°C was above average, and ranked as the 32nd warmest September Highs since 1880. 

September 2020's Highs were a close match for 2017, and were warmer than 2014, 2015, 2016, 2018 & 2019. But going back a few years we had a series of really warm Septembers in 2009, 2011, 2012 & 2013 which all had average Highs above 20°C.

You can also toggle this chart to show the Lows, and September 2020's average Low of 7.4°C ranked as the 15th warmest September Lows since 1880. Over the past century September's average Low has increased from 2.5°C up to 6.4°C today.

In this chart each month since 2000 is represented a bubble, and the size of the bubble represents how much warmer or colder it was compared to the 20th century average for that month. Months which were warmer than the 20th century average are orange, and cooler months are blue.

September 2020's Highs were 1.8°C warmer than the 20th century average, and are an orange bubble. That follows the orange bubble for August at 1.2°C warmer than the 20th century average. But before that March-July 2020 were all either cool, or were right on the long-run average.

Looking across the country September was really warm in St. John's with an average High 3°C warmer than their 20th century average for September. And Vancouver, Edmonton & Calgary were all in the 1.6-1.9°C warmer range.

In comparison the central cities were all much closer to their 20th century averages. But it's worth pointing out that while Ottawa's average High of 19.8°C was -0.3°C below their 20th century average, it was still warmer than the "warm" September we had in Edmonton with an average High of 18.7°C.

Precipitation

In terms of precipitation this was a very dry September in Edmonton. September averages 33.4mm of precipitation, and Blatchford recorded only 5mm, which makes 2020 roughly the 7th lowest since 1880. The International recorded a bit more at 9.3mm, which was the airport's 6th lowest September since 1961.

Looking back over the year April was also extremely dry, but then May through August were all well above average.

For 2020 so far Blatchford has recorded 462.5mm of precipitation, and the International has 458.6mm. That is about 75mm above the average for this time of year, which is 386.2mm.

October Temperatures

For October temperatures, we have probably mostly seen the end of our 20°C days: October averages about 1 per month, but half of the time it doesn't have any. And we'll probably start seeing some below-freezing Highs, with October averaging 2 days below 0°C. For the Lows we will undoubtedly get our first frost, because October averages about 16 Lows above freezing. 

August 2020 Review / September 2020 Preview

What did we all think of August 2020? And how did the summer of 2020 compare? Let's find out.

High Temperatures

The late-July warmspell continued into the first week of August, followed by a week of slightly-below-average days, and then a few more hot days, and then we ended the month just on the cooler side of things. In total we had 13 Highs below average, and 18 above average. The warm days included two warmest-in-30-year Highs on August 2nd at 29.9°C and August 17th at 31.0°C.

Overall 26 days had highs which hit 20°C, when August's average is 23 days. That included 8 days at 25°C, compared to an August average of 9 days, and we had 2 days hit 30°C.

The end of the month felt a little chilly, and it was a little below average, but our coldest High was 16.6°C on the 30th. About half of the time August will have even colder Highs below 15°C, and 2002, 2004 & 2005 all had Highs below 10°C.

Hot Days

For the summer so far we have had 22 days hit 25°C. That's 2 more than the 20 which we had in 2019, but it is way down from the 34-54 which we had in the 4 warm summers from 2014-2018. The average is about 30 Highs at 25°C each summer, and so we were below that, and ranked as 107th out of 140 years.

We had 10 days hit 28°C, which is about average. That included 2 Highs at 30°C, which is below the average of 4 days. And for slightly milder days we have had 83 highs hit 20°C, which is basically right on the average.

Low Temperatures

The Lows started the month right at the top of the range, and then finished right at the bottom. Overall there were 12 Lows below average, and 19 above average. That included a warmest-in-30-years Low on August 2nd at 18.9°C, and a coldest-in-30-years on August 31st at 3.4°C.

Looking at the numbers, we did have one cool night below 5°C on the 31st, and those only happen about half of the time. Most of the Lows were between 10-15°C which is pretty typical for August.

Warm & Cold Months

August 2020's average High was 23.3°C, which was just above the recent average of 22.9°C and ranked as the 39th warmest overall. Over the years August's average High has stayed fairly close to 22°C.

If you flip the chart to show the Lows, August 2020's Low of 11.8°C ranked as 20th warmest. It was right on the recent average, but well above where things were a century ago when the average was around 8°C.

This chart shows the average High temperatures for each month going back to 2000. The bubbles represent how much warmer or colder each month was compared to the 20th century average, with big orange bubbles being much warmer, and blue bubbles being cooler.

August 2020's average High was 1.2°C warmer than the 20th century average for August, so it appears as a medium-sized orange bubble. That is the first notably orange bubble that we have seen since back in February, with March & April both notable cold, and May-July all right around the average. It also makes a difference from 2019, where the string of cool~ish months ran from May through October.

For the whole "summer" from May through August this ranked as Edmonton's 58th warmest, with an almost equal split between above-average and below-average Highs. In comparison 2019 was the 110th warmest, 2018 was 2nd warmest (after 1898 for some reason) and 2017 was 7th warmest.

Looking across the country the Highs for August 2020 ranged from right on the average in Ottawa and Vancouver, up to 2.6°C warmer than average in Calgary and 3.3°C warmer in Regina.

Monthly Precipitation

August's precipitation was above average at both Blatchford with 83mm and the International with 66mm. That is compared to an August average of 52.8mm, and it means that following an extremely dry April all of the summer months were above average.

For precipitation for the year so far the two Edmonton stations are very close, with Blatchford at 457mm and the International at 449mm. That is about 100mm above the for the end of August, which is 351mm.

A lot of Blachford's August rain came from one 33mm storm on August 3rd, which was the second largest of the year after 36mm on May 21st.

September Temperatures

For September Highs we still average 10 days at 20°C, including 3 at 25°C. Highs below 10°C only happen about half of the time, and in the last 20 years only 6 Septembers had a High below 5°C. But 2 of those years happened to be 2018 and 2019.

For September Lows, about half of the time September is frost-free, but we can see the below-freezing days creeping in as blue squares. September 2019 had 3 night with frosts, and 2018 had a ridiculous 8 of them.

July 2020 Review / August 2020 Preview

When you think back to the covid-summer of 2020, do you think you will remember the first 3 cool & rainy weeks of July, or the final hot one?

High Temperatures

The first few weeks of July 2020 weren't exactly cold, but there was a total lack of hot days.

The grey band in the middle of this chart is the 25th-75th percentiles for our High temperatures, which is where the temperatures will fall about half of the time. In the first part of the month July 1, 2, 7, 8, 12 & 13 were all below the 25th percentile and were pretty chilly for July. And only 1 day was actually above the 75th percentile into "hot" territory: July 16th at 27.1°C.

That all changed on July 27th when the temperatures finally (finally) jumped above average. They stayed there until the end of the month, and the forecasts say they will continue at least a little longer into August.

At the end of the month we finished with 17 days below average (including a 30-year coldest High), and 14 days above average.

In terms of the individual temperatures we didn't hit 30°C, but we did end up with 10 days at 25°C. That's below the July average of 12 days, but above years like 2019, 2011, 2010...

July 2020's average High of 23.4°C was on the cooler side of recent years, ranking as 12th warmest since 2000.

Hot Days So Far...

So far this summer we have had 14 days hit 25°C, which ties what we had last year in 2019. It's about 20-30 fewer than the very hot summers of 2015-2018, though. And it's a bit below the long-term average, which is about 20 Highs at 25°C by this point in the summer.

For slightly hotter days, we had our first 28°C High quite late on July 27th. We have now had 3 of those, while the average is around 6. And for milder 20°C days we have had 57, and that is below 2015-2018, but is pretty close to the long-term average.

Low Temperatures

The Low temperatures look a lot like the Highs, although at the end of the month we were right at the top of our 30-year range (and 0.1~0.2°C from the records).

The range of our July Low temperatures is usually very tight, and this year we had 4 nights below 10°C, 4 nights above 15°C, and everything else was between 10-15°C.

Warm & Cold Months

July 2020's average High of 23.4°C was just a bit below the recent average of 23.7°C and ranked as #67 our of 140. That average has stayed fairly level since records began in the 1880s, starting at 22.6°C, and rising as high as 24°C in the 1930s, and then dropping down to 22.4°C in the late 1990s.

July 2020's average Low of 12.9°C is right on the recent average, and ranks as #13 out of 140. While the July Highs have stayed fairly constant over the years, the average Lows have steadily increased from 8.5°C a century ago to about 13°C today.

Usually in these monthly reviews we talk about the mean temperatures (High & Low) of each month, but this is the middle of summer, and what people really care about are the Highs. So sticking with the Highs temperatures, in this chart the bubbles represent the average Highs for each month going back to 2000. These are compared to the 20th century average, and so big, orange bubbles were warmer than the 20th century average, and big, blue bubbles were colder.

You might notice that it has been a while since we have seen an orange bubble, because the last "warm" (above-average) Highs that we saw were back in February. Highs in March & April were both about 2°C below the 20th century average, and May, June & July 2020 barely show up here because they were so close to average.

So far during what we might call "summer" 2020 hasn't had any hot months, and it joins 2019, 2010, 2009, 2008, 2005, 2004 & 2000 which all had average-to-cool Highs for May through July. In 2019 that continued through August & September, and we didn't get another "warm" month until November. But hopefully August will turn things around for 2020.

Across the Country

Here we are taking a look at the Highs for July 2020 across the country, and there was quite a wide range. St. John's, Calgary & Vancouver were all 1°C or more below their 20th century averages, while Toronto, Ottawa & Montréal were 3.5~4°C above theirs.

 

This is a quick look at Toronto's Highs for July 2020. Their average High for the whole month was 30.3°C, which was the 2nd highest since 1880 (1921's average High was 31.2°C). Ottawa and Montréal are available in the dropdown on the upper right, and they look similar.

Monthly Precipitation

Heading back to Edmonton, and switching over to precipitation, in July Blatchford received 121.2mm which was its 27th rainiest July since 1880 (and below the 163.4mm in 2019). The International received 95.3mm, which was also its 27th rainiest, although those records only go back to 1960 (and it was also below the 118.6mm in 2019).

July's average precipitation is 90.8mm, so the International was just a bit above that, while Blatchford was above the 75th percentile and into the realm of "lots of rain." And looking at the chart June and May also both had lots of rain at both stations.

Blatchford's May-June-July total of 319.6mm was actually its 5th highest since 1880 (1901 leads with 410.4mm). The International's 310.1mm was its 3rd highest May-June-July since 1960 (2010 had 332mm).

Days With Rain

July averages 15 days with rain, and in 2020 Blatchford recorded 17 days while the International had 20. So it was not as rainy as it might have seemed. July is usually our rainiest month, and from mid-June through mid-July is our little monsoon season.

Precipitation So Far...

For 2020 so far the International has recorded 383.8mm of total precipitation (rain + snow), and Blatchford is just a bit below that at 374.5mm. The average for this time of year is 300mm, so we are definitely above average, and things really took-off in May, June & July after our very dry April.

August Temperatures

For August the daytime Highs are above 20°C most of the time, with typically about 25 warm days each month. We also average a week or two of days above 25°C, but 30°C days only happen about half of the time in August. For the Low temperatures it should be a lot of the same 10-20°C orange which we saw for July, but with a few more nights in the 5-10°C range, and every 5 years-or-so a night below 5°C. And also, August's average precipitation is about half of July's.

August 2019 was pretty blah, but that followed a string of warm years from 2011-2018. So hopefully last year was the anomaly, and summer 2020 actually hangs around for awhile this time.