It’s no secret that 2024 was hot. In fact, it was the hottest year ever recorded, with massive heat waves plowing through the US on multiple occasions. It followed up on 2023, which was also the hottest year at the time. Based on predictions, the heat is likely to get even worse over the next five years. 

The World Meteorological Organization on Wednesday published its predictions for the next five years. It reports that there’s a roughly 80% chance that at least one of the next five years will surpass 2024 as the warmest humans have seen since recordkeeping began in 1850. 

“We have just experienced the 10 warmest years on record. Unfortunately, this WMO report provides no sign of respite over the coming years, and this means that there will be a growing negative impact on our economies, our daily lives, our ecosystems, and our planet,” WMO Deputy Secretary-General Ko Barrett said in a statement.

In addition, the WMO predicts a 70% chance that the average warming increase will be higher than 1.5 degrees Celsius over the next five years. This is significant because it’s the long-term limit set by the Paris Agreement, indicating that climate change is getting dangerously close to exceeding the agreement’s goals. However, the UN notes that individual months or years can fluctuate due to things like El Niño/La Niña and other weather adjustments. The first calendar year period with temps exceeding the 1.5 degrees Celsius threshold was 2024. 

Arctic warming is also predicted to continue

Despite the surprising growth of ice in the Arctic due to uncharacteristic snowfall in early 2025, that famously frigid part of the planet is also expected to warm even more than the rest of the globe due to a phenomenon known as Arctic amplification. This is caused by bright, reflective sea ice melting, allowing the sun to better warm the darker water underneath. This has a snowball effect where the Arctic gets warmer faster as it loses more and more ice. 

While global temperatures exceeded 1.5 degrees Celsius in 2024 and will likely do so again over the next five years, the temperatures in the Arctic are even warmer. 

WMO predicts that the Arctic will warm up by “three and a half times the global average” for the next five winters. The prediction goes on to say that further reduction of sea ice is probable, while weather conditions in northern regions like Alaska, northern Europe and northern Siberia will likely be wetter than average due to warming.