
NOAA has placed an 82 per cent probability that El Niño will emerge in the central Pacific between May and July 2026, the climate state that in 1997-98 caused more than 20,000 deaths worldwide and approximately US$36 billion in damage, that in 2015-16 produced what was then the warmest year on record and the most extensive Amazon drought yet measured, and that has accompanied every one of the ten warmest years in the global temperature record, all of which have occurred since 2015
NOAA's Climate Prediction Center issued an El Niño Watch on 12 March 2026, the formal alert level indicating favourable conditions for the development of the climate state called El Niño within the following four months.










