The United Kingdom experienced an average of 1,242.1 millimeters of rainfall in 2024, a decrease of 5.8 percent in comparison to the previous year. While 2024 saw substantial rainfall, it did not surpass the thus-far peak of the century, with 1,373 millimeters of rain recorded in 2000. Regional variations and seasonal patterns Rainfall distribution across the UK is far from uniform, with Scotland and Wales consistently receiving the highest annual precipitation. In 2024, they recorded an average of 1,571.7 millimeters and 1,600.8 millimeters, respectively, significantly above the UK’s average. This disparity is largely due to both countries’ mountainous terrain, which is more susceptible to Atlantic weather systems. Seasonally, the wettest months in the UK typically occur in the winter, with the highest precipitation levels seen between November and February. Climate change impact on UK weather Climate change is influencing UK weather patterns, leading to warmer and wetter conditions overall. While annual rainfall fluctuates, there is a trend towards more extreme weather events. For example, 2020 and 2022 saw rain deviations from the long-term mean in the UK of more than 100 millimeters in February. As weather patterns continue to evolve, monitoring rainfall trends remains crucial for understanding and adapting to a changing climate.

The UK daily rainfall data contain rainfall accumulation and precipitation amounts over a 24 hour period. The data were collected by observation stations operated by the Met Office across the UK and transmitted within the following message types: NCM, AWSDLY, DLY3208 and SSER. The data spans from 1853 to 2023. Over time a range of rain gauges have been used - see section 5.6 and the relevant message type information in the linked MIDAS User Guide for further details.

This version supersedes the previous version (202308) of this dataset and a change log is available in the archive, and in the linked documentation for this record, detailing the differences between this version and the previous version. The change logs detail new, replaced and removed data. These include the addition of data for calendar year 2023.

This dataset is part of the Midas-open dataset collection made available by the Met Office under the UK Open Government Licence, containing only UK mainland land surface observations owned or operated by Met Office. It is a subset of the fuller, restricted Met Office Integrated Data Archive System (MIDAS) Land and Marine Surface Stations dataset, also available through the Centre for Environmental Data Analysis - see the related dataset section on this record. A large proportion of the UK raingauge observing network (associated with WAHRAIN, WADRAIN and WAMRAIN for hourly, daily and monthly rainfall measurements respectively) is operated by other agencies beyond the Met Office, and are consequently currently excluded from the Midas-open dataset. Currently this represents approximately 13% of available daily rainfall observations within the full MIDAS collection.

Between 2001 and 2024, the average rainfall in the United Kingdom varied greatly. In 2010, rainfall dropped to a low of 1,020 millimeters, which was a noticeable decrease when compared to the previous year. However, the following year, rainfall increased significantly to a peak of 1,889 millimeters. During the period in consideration, rainfall rarely rose above 1,500 millimeters. In 2024, the annual average rainfall in the UK surpassed 1,386 millimeters. Monthly rainfall On average, rainfall is most common at the start and end of the year. Between 2014 and 2024, monthly rainfall peaked in December 2015 at approximately 217 millimeters. This was the first of only two times during this period that the average monthly rainfall rose above 200 millimeters. This was a deviation from December’s long-term mean of some 134 millimeters. Rainfall highest in Scotland In the United Kingdom, rain is often concentrated around mountainous regions such as the Scottish Highlands, so it is no surprise to see that – on average – it is Scotland that receives the most rainfall annually. However, in 2024, Wales received the highest rainfall amounting to approximately 1,600 millimeters. Geographically, it is the north and west of the United Kingdom that receives the lion's share of rain, as it is more susceptible to rainfall coming in from the Atlantic.

The UK hourly rainfall data contain the rainfall amount (and duration from tilting syphon gauges) during the hour (or hours) ending at the specified time. The data also contains precipitation amounts, however precipitation measured over 24 hours are not stored. Over time a range of rain gauges have been used - see the linked MIDAS User Guide for further details. This version supersedes the previous version of this dataset and a change log is available in the archive, and in the linked documentation for this record, detailing the differences between this version and the previous version. The change logs detail new, replaced and removed data. The data were collected by observation stations operated by the Met Office across the UK and transmitted within the following message types: NCM, AWSHRLY, DLY3208, SREW and SSER. The data spans from 1915 to 2020. This dataset is part of the Midas-open dataset collection made available by the Met Office under the UK Open Government Licence, containing only UK mainland land surface observations owned or operated by the Met Office. It is a subset of the fuller, restricted Met Office Integrated Data Archive System (MIDAS) Land and Marine Surface Stations dataset, also available through the Centre for Environmental Data Analysis - see the related dataset section on this record. A large proportion of the UK raingauge observing network (associated with WAHRAIN, WADRAIN and WAMRAIN for hourly, daily and monthly rainfall measurements respectively) is operated by other agencies beyond the Met Office, and are consequently currently excluded from the Midas-open dataset.

The UK hourly weather observation data contain meteorological values measured on an hourly time scale. The measurements of the concrete state, wind speed and direction, cloud type and amount, visibility, and temperature were recorded by observation stations operated by the Met Office across the UK and transmitted within SYNOP, DLY3208, AWSHRLY and NCM messages. The sunshine duration measurements were transmitted in the HSUN3445 message. The data spans from 1875 to 2023.

This version supersedes the previous version of this dataset and a change log is available in the archive, and in the linked documentation for this record, detailing the differences between this version and the previous version. The change logs detail new, replaced and removed data. These include the addition of data for calendar year 2023.

For details on observing practice see the message type information in the MIDAS User Guide linked from this record and relevant sections for parameter types.

This dataset is part of the Midas-open dataset collection made available by the Met Office under the UK Open Government Licence, containing only UK mainland land surface observations owned or operated by Met Office. It is a subset of the fuller, restricted Met Office Integrated Data Archive System (MIDAS) Land and Marine Surface Stations dataset, also available through the Centre for Environmental Data Analysis - see the related dataset section on this record. Note, METAR message types are not included in the Open version of this dataset. Those data may be accessed via the full MIDAS hourly weather data.

Precipitation in the United Kingdom increased to 1404.08 mm in 2023 from 1121.47 mm in 2022. This dataset includes a chart with historical data for the United Kingdom Average Precipitation.

The wettest months in the United Kingdom tend to be at the start and end of the year. In the period of consideration, the greatest measurement of rainfall was nearly 217 millimeters, recorded in December 2015. The lowest level of rainfall was recorded in April 2021, at 20.6 millimeters. Rainy days The British Isles are known for their wet weather, and in 2024 there were approximately 164 rain days in the United Kingdom. A rainday is when more than one millimeter of rain falls within a day. Over the past 30 years, the greatest number of rain days was recorded in the year 2000. In that year, the average annual rainfall in the UK amounted to 1,242.1 millimeters. Climate change According to the Met Office, climate change in the United Kingdom has resulted in the weather getting warmer and wetter. In 2022, the annual average temperature in the country reached a new record high, surpassing 10 degrees Celsius for the first time. This represented an increase of nearly two degrees Celsius when compared to the annual average temperature recorded in 1910. In a recent survey conducted amongst UK residents, almost 80 percent of respondents had concerns about climate change.

The UK hourly rainfall data contain the rainfall amount (and duration from tilting syphon gauges) during the hour (or hours) ending at the specified time. The data also contains precipitation amounts, however precipitation measured over 24 hours are not stored. Over time a range of rain gauges have been used - see the linked MIDAS User Guide for further details.

This version supersedes the previous version of this dataset and a change log is available in the archive, and in the linked documentation for this record, detailing the differences between this version and the previous version. The change logs detail new, replaced and removed data.

The data were collected by observation stations operated by the Met Office across the UK and transmitted within the following message types: NCM, AWSHRLY, DLY3208, SREW and SSER. The data spans from 1915 to 2023.

This dataset is part of the Midas-open dataset collection made available by the Met Office under the UK Open Government Licence, containing only UK mainland land surface observations owned or operated by the Met Office. It is a subset of the fuller, restricted Met Office Integrated Data Archive System (MIDAS) Land and Marine Surface Stations dataset, also available through the Centre for Environmental Data Analysis - see the related dataset section on this record. A large proportion of the UK raingauge observing network (associated with WAHRAIN, WADRAIN and WAMRAIN for hourly, daily and monthly rainfall measurements respectively) is operated by other agencies beyond the Met Office, and are consequently currently excluded from the Midas-open dataset.

Monthly Historical information for 37 UK Meteorological Stations. Most go back to the early 1900s, but some go back as far as 1853.

Data includes:

• Mean maximum temperature (tmax)
• Mean minimum temperature (tmin)
• Days of air frost (af)
• Total rainfall (rain)
• Total sunshine duration (sun)

Station data files are updated on a rolling monthly basis, around 10 days after the end of the month. Data are indicated as provisional until the full network quality control has been carried out. After this, data are final.

No allowances have been made for small site changes and developments in instrumentation.

Data and statistics for other stations, and associated charges, can be obtained by contacting our Customer Centre.

The UK hourly rainfall data contain the rainfall amount (and duration from tilting syphon gauges) during the hour (or hours) ending at the specified time. The data also contains precipitation amounts, however precipitation measured over 24 hours are not stored. Over time a range of rain gauges have been used - see the linked MIDAS User Guide for further details. This version supersedes the previous version of this dataset and a change log is available in the archive, and in the linked documentation for this record, detailing the differences between this version and the previous version. The change logs detail new, replaced and removed data. The data were collected by observation stations operated by the Met Office across the UK and transmitted within the following message types: NCM, AWSHRLY, DLY3208, SREW and SSER. The data spans from 1915 to 2019. This dataset is part of the Midas-open dataset collection made available by the Met Office under the UK Open Government Licence, containing only UK mainland land surface observations owned or operated by the Met Office. It is a subset of the fuller, restricted Met Office Integrated Data Archive System (MIDAS) Land and Marine Surface Stations dataset, also available through the Centre for Environmental Data Analysis - see the related dataset section on this record. A large proportion of the UK raingauge observing network (associated with WAHRAIN, WADRAIN and WAMRAIN for hourly, daily and monthly rainfall measurements respectively) is operated by other agencies beyond the Met Office, and are consequently currently excluded from the Midas-open dataset.

The United Kingdom saw an average rainfall of 1,319 millimeters in 2023. Between 2014 and 2023, precipitation in the UK was approximately nine percent higher than in the period between 1961 and 1990. In addition to an increase in rainfall, average annual temperatures have also risen during the same period. Altogether, the weather in the United Kingdom is getting hotter and wetter.

Rainfall averages for UK over the 30-year 1961-1990, interpolated to a 1 km grid. This 30-year period is a Primary Reference Period recommended by World Meteorological Organisation.

1 km gridded estimates of daily and monthly rainfall for Great-Britain and Northern Ireland (together with approximately 3000 km2 of catchment in the Republic of Ireland) from 1890 to 2019. The rainfall estimates are derived from the Met Office national database of observed precipitation. To derive the estimates, monthly and daily (when complete month available) precipitation totals from the UK rain gauge network are used. The natural neighbour interpolation methodology, including a normalisation step based on average annual rainfall, was used to generate the daily and monthly estimates. The estimated rainfall on a given day refers to the rainfall amount precipitated in 24 hours between 9am on that day until 9am on the following day. The CEH-GEAR dataset has been developed according to the guidance provided in BS 7843-4:2012. Full details about this dataset can be found at https://doi.org/10.5285/dbf13dd5-90cd-457a-a986-f2f9dd97e93c

Licence information and source

The MET Office copyright policy can be found at: [https://www.metoffice.gov.uk/about-us/legal#licences] Data source from: [https://www.metoffice.gov.uk/research/climate/maps-and-data/historic-station-data]

Cover image: [https://pixabay.com/photos/scarborough-sunrise-seascape-2850597/]

United Kingdom UK: Average Precipitation in Depth data was reported at 1,220.000 mm/Year in 2014. This stayed constant from the previous number of 1,220.000 mm/Year for 2012. United Kingdom UK: Average Precipitation in Depth data is updated yearly, averaging 1,220.000 mm/Year from Dec 1962 (Median) to 2014, with 12 observations. The data reached an all-time high of 1,220.000 mm/Year in 2014 and a record low of 1,220.000 mm/Year in 2014. United Kingdom UK: Average Precipitation in Depth data remains active status in CEIC and is reported by World Bank. The data is categorized under Global Database’s United Kingdom – Table UK.World Bank.WDI: Land Use, Protected Areas and National Wealth. Average precipitation is the long-term average in depth (over space and time) of annual precipitation in the country. Precipitation is defined as any kind of water that falls from clouds as a liquid or a solid.; ; Food and Agriculture Organization, electronic files and web site.; ;

Average Rainfall (mm) and average Temperature (centigrade) for the North East England and East England Met Office Climate district, which includes Lincolnshire. This dataset shows the average Rainfall in millimetres and average Temperature in centigrade, by month, meteorological season, and annual calendar year. The data is sourced from the UK Met Office website. See the Source link for more information about the data and the area it covers.

This record is for Approval for Access product AfA501 for approximately 1000 automatic rainfall data from the Environment Agency rainfall API.

The data is available on an update cycle which varies across the country, typically updated daily but updated faster is rainfall is detected. This is update frequency is usually increased during times of flooding, etc.

Readings are transferred via telemetry to internal and external systems in or close to real-time.

Measurement of the rainfall is taken in millimetres (mm) accumulated over 15 minutes. Note that rainfall data is recorded in GMT, so during British Summer Time (BST) data may appear to be an hour old. Data comes from a network of over 1000 gauges across England. Data shown is raw data collected from the gauges and is subject to quality control procedures. As a result, values may change after publication on this website.

Continuous rainfall information is also stored on our hydrometric archive, Wiski, and can be provided in non real-time on request through our customer contact centre. This raw rainfall data is provided to the Met Office for quality control along with all the data from our registered daily storage gauges (c.1400). The quality controlled dataset is covered in AfA148 Quality Controlled Daily and Monthly Raingauge Data from Environment Agency Gauges.

Data from a small selection of Met Office raingauges are included in our open data feed. This data is also available from the Met Office as open data.

[THIS DATASET HAS BEEN WITHDRAWN]. 5km gridded Standardised Precipitation Index (SPI) data for Great Britain, which is a drought index based on the probability of precipitation for a given accumulation period as defined by [1]. SPI is calculated for different accumulation periods: 1, 3, 6, 9, 12, 18, 24 months. Each of these is in turn calculated for each of the twelve calendar months. Note that values in monthly (and for longer accumulation periods also annual) time series of the data therefore are likely to be autocorrelated. The standard period which was used to fit the gamma distribution is 1961-2010. The dataset covers the period from 1862 to 2015. This release supersedes the previous version, doi:10.5285/ed7444fc-8c2a-473e-98cd-e68d3cffa2b0, as it addresses localised issues with the source data (Met Office monthly rainfall grids) for the period 1960 to 2000. It also supersedes version 2 of the dataset with the same title (doi:10.5285/1b228b42-42f8-4aee-b964-2c92a21d5556). Version 2 contained incorrect files for SPI18 (duplicated SPI12 files). NOTE: the difference between this dataset with the previously published dataset 'Gridded Standardized Precipitation Index (SPI) using gamma distribution with standard period 1961-2010 for Great Britain [SPIgamma61-10]" [2], apart from the temporal and spatial extent, is the underlying rainfall data from which SPI was calculated. In the previously published dataset, CEH-GEAR [3], [4] was used, whereas in this new version, Met Office 5km rainfall grids were used (see supporting information for more details). The methodology to calculate SPI is the same in the two datasets. [1] McKee, T. B., Doesken, N. J., Kleist, J. (1993). The Relationship of Drought Frequency and Duration to Time Scales. Eighth Conference on Applied Climatology, 17-22 January 1993, Anaheim, California. [2] Tanguy, M.; Hannaford, J.; Barker, L.; Svensson, C.; Kral, F.; Fry, M. (2015). Gridded Standardized Precipitation Index (SPI) using gamma distribution with standard period 1961-2010 for Great Britain [SPIgamma61-10]. NERC Environmental Information Data Centre. https://doi.org/10.5285/94c9eaa3-a178-4de4-8905-dbfab03b69a0 [3] Keller, V. D. J., Tanguy, M., Prosdocimi, I., Terry, J. A., Hitt, O., Cole, S. J., Fry, M., Morris, D. G., and Dixon, H.: CEH-GEAR: 1 km resolution daily and monthly areal rainfall estimates for the UK for hydrological use, Earth Syst. Sci. Data Discuss., 8, 83-112, doi:10.5194/essdd-8-83-2015, 2015. [4] Tanguy, M.; Dixon, H.; Prosdocimi, I.; Morris, D. G.; Keller, V. D. J. (2014). Gridded estimates of daily and monthly areal rainfall for the United Kingdom (1890-2012) [CEH-GEAR]. NERC Environmental Information Data Centre. https://doi.org/10.5285/5dc179dc-f692-49ba-9326-a6893a503f6e Full details about this dataset can be found at https://doi.org/10.5285/12c3a0d7-741c-4b1f-bfcb-f72ce5b43036

The highest average temperature recorded in 2024 until November was in August, at 16.8 degrees Celsius. Since 2015, the highest average daily temperature in the UK was registered in July 2018, at 18.7 degrees Celsius. The summer of 2018 was the joint hottest since institutions began recording temperatures in 1910. One noticeable anomaly during this period was in December 2015, when the average daily temperature reached 9.5 degrees Celsius. This month also experienced the highest monthly rainfall in the UK since before 2014, with England, Wales, and Scotland suffering widespread flooding. Daily hours of sunshine Unsurprisingly, the heat wave that spread across the British Isles in 2018 was the result of particularly sunny weather. July 2018 saw an average of 8.7 daily sun hours in the United Kingdom. This was more hours of sun than was recorded in July 2024, which only saw 5.8 hours of sun. Temperatures are on the rise Since the 1960s, there has been an increase in regional temperatures across the UK. Between 1961 and 1990, temperatures in England averaged nine degrees Celsius, and from 2013 to 2022, average temperatures in the country had increased to 10.3 degrees Celsius. Due to its relatively southern location, England continues to rank as the warmest country in the UK.