August broke the global heat record. The ocean set one too.
NOAA says August 2026 was the warmest August in its record, while global sea-surface temperatures and the June–August average also reached new highs.
Two records arrived together
August 2026 was the warmest August in NOAA's global record, and the world's oceans reached their highest August temperature on record at the same time. The paired records sharpen the signal behind a single month's number: the heat was spread across land and sea, not confined to one region. ncei
A record that beat the last record
NOAA's National Centers for Environmental Information measured August's global surface temperature at 1.32°C (2.38°F) above the 20th-century average. That was 0.08°C (0.14°F) above the previous August record, a tie set in 2023 and 2024. It was the 48th straight August warmer than the 20th-century average; all 10 of the warmest Augusts have occurred since 2016. ncei
The map is broad rather than uniform. Temperatures at least 2°C above average covered parts of Europe, Africa, Asia, Antarctica, North and South America, the North Pacific and much of the central and eastern tropical Pacific. North America and Africa each had their warmest August, while Asia had its second-warmest. ncei
The ocean is part of the headline
NOAA says global sea-surface temperature also set an August record. That matters because the ocean stores and redistributes heat, and because its warmth helps shape weather far beyond the coast. The agency linked record-high temperatures across the tropical Pacific to El Niño conditions, while noting that the Atlantic was unusually quiet and the eastern North Pacific produced eight named storms. ncei
The month also came with a smaller global sea-ice footprint: the combined extent was the fourth-lowest for August in NOAA's 48-year record, 870,000 square miles below the 1991–2020 average. The Arctic was 340,000 square miles below average and Antarctica 530,000 square miles below average. ncei
A record season, not just a record month
The June–August global average was also a record, 1.21°C (2.18°F) above the 20th-century average. That made it the warmest Northern Hemisphere meteorological summer and the second-warmest Southern Hemisphere winter in NOAA's 177-year record. ncei
January through August ranked second-warmest. NOAA's annual outlook says 2026 is very likely to finish among the five warmest years, with the second-warmest outcome most likely. The next test is whether the remaining months widen that lead—or merely keep an already exceptional year near the top. ncei