El Niño Reaches 2.0 Degrees on NOAA's Index, a Tenth Behind 1997–98, With a Record in Reach This Winter

AUSTIN — The El Niño building in the tropical Pacific has reached +2.0 degrees Celsius on NOAA's official index for August through October 2026, the second-highest reading for that time of year since records began in 1950, The Watchers reported on November 10 from NOAA Climate Prediction Center data. Only the 1997–98 event stood higher at the same point, at +2.07 degrees — a gap of a tenth of a degree that has narrowed for three straight readings, from 0.14 behind in June–August to 0.15 in July–September to 0.10 in August–October.

The figure comes from the Relative Oceanic Niño Index, the Climate Prediction Center's principal measure of El Niño strength; the full data table gives the August–October value as +1.97 degrees. The current event has already moved past 2015–16 for this time of year — that El Niño stood at +1.80 and peaked at +2.25 that winter — while the highest three-month value in NOAA's record remains +2.40, set in December 1982 to February 1983. NOAA notes the latest values are provisional and may be revised for up to two months, so a gap this small could still shift.

The official forecast points toward a record. In its October 8 ENSO discussion, the Climate Prediction Center said the chances “remain high for a historic event” — defined as a three-month index of +2.5 degrees or more, stronger than every El Niño since 1950 — and put that outcome at 83 percent for October–December and 70 percent for November–January. The center expects a strong to very strong El Niño to last through January–March 2027, with the event persisting into spring before neutral conditions are favored by April–June; its next monthly ENSO discussion is due November 12 and will update the record odds.

For Texas, the relevance is the pattern, not a promise. The Watchers' account noted the Climate Prediction Center's caution that an event of this size makes typical El Niño impacts more likely without guaranteeing them: the typical winter pattern brings a more active storm track across the southern United States and milder, drier conditions across much of the north. The same report, citing The Weather Company, said some U.S. signals were already showing by early November — the Atlantic hurricane season had produced only one hurricane, the fewest since 1925, and Albuquerque, Flagstaff and West Palm Beach had recorded their wettest fall to date through November 4 — while forecasters also noted that the warm subsurface anomalies feeding the event held steady from August to mid-October and have decreased slightly since.