It won’t be a great summer. And not even a particularly hot year. According to scientists, the next five years could mark a new phase of the climate crisis, with global temperatures set to remain permanently at or very close to record levels.
The alarm is raised by the new Global Annual to Decadal Climate Update from the World Meteorological Organization (WMO), according to which between 2026 and 2030 the global average temperature could remain between 1.3°C and 1.9°C above pre-industrial levels (1850-1900).
The most worrying fact? There is a 91% probability that at least one of the next five years will exceed the threshold of 1.5°C of global warming, the symbolic limit of the Paris Agreement. And there is also an 86% probability that a new temperature record will be broken, surpassing the record set by 2024, the hottest year on record so far.
2027 could be the warmest year on record
Of all the years under observation, 2027 is the one that worries experts the most. In fact, WMO forecasts indicate a possible return of El Niño between the end of 2026 and the beginning of 2027. The climate phenomenon, which occurs on average every two to seven years with the anomalous warming of the surface waters of the equatorial Pacific, tends to amplify the global warming already underway.
This also happened between 2023 and 2024, when the combination of climate change and El Niño helped push global temperatures towards unprecedented levels. The new simulations show a higher probability of El Niño conditions especially in 2027 and 2028, increasing the risk of new records.
What exceeding 1.5°C really means
The threshold of 1.5°C set by the Paris Agreement does not refer to the temperature of a single year, but to the average recorded over approximately twenty years. This means that just because a year temporarily exceeds that limit does not automatically mean that the target has been permanently missed. However, it represents a clear indicator of the direction in which we are going.
And the trend still seems unequivocal: the probability of recording years above 1.5°C continues to increase year after year.
The Arctic continues to be among the most vulnerable areas: according to the report, in the next five winters temperatures in the Arctic region will on average be 2.8°C higher than the values recorded in the period 1991-2020. This is an anomaly more than three times higher than the global average.
The consequences are already visible. Climate models predict a further reduction in sea ice, especially in the Barents Sea, between Norway and Russia, in the Bering Sea between Alaska and Siberia, and in the Sea of Okhotsk, between eastern Russia and Japan. A loss that does not only concern polar ecosystems: Arctic ice plays a fundamental role in regulating the climate of the entire planet.
The last five years already tell the future
In reality, many of the expected changes are already before our eyes. 2025 was one of the three warmest years on record globally, with an average temperature of around 1.43°C above pre-industrial levels. Between 2021 and 2025, warming was particularly intense in Europe, North America, North Africa and especially in the Arctic.
For WMO scientists, the message is clear: it is no longer a question of understanding whether the planet will continue to warm, but how quickly we will be able to reduce emissions to limit the impacts of a warming that is already reshaping ecosystems, water resources and living conditions in many areas of the world.
HERE is the complete WMO report.
