2016 Hottest Year on Record

  • Released Monday, February 6th, 2017
  • Updated Wednesday, May 3rd, 2023 at 1:47PM
  • ID: 12468
For the third year in a row, global warm temperatures break records in 2016.

For the third year in a row, global warm temperatures break records in 2016.

2016 was the hottest year on record, continuing a decades-long warming trend and breaking the record held by 2015, which in turn broke the record held by 2014. Scientists at NASA’s Goddard Institute for Space Studies (GISS) analyzed measurements from 6,300 weather stations, ship- and buoy-based observations of sea surface temperatures, and temperature measurements from Antarctic research stations. They found that Earth’s average surface temperature has risen about 2 degrees Fahrenheit (1.1 degrees Celsius) since the late-19th century, largely a result of human emissions into the atmosphere. Scientists at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) separately analyzed the data and came to the same conclusion. Most of the globe’s warming has occurred in the last 35 years. Sixteen of the last 17 warmest years on record have occurred since 2001. Watch the video to see how temperatures have changed from 1880 to 2016.

Watch a progression of changing global surface temperatures anomalies from 1880 through 2016, which broke a new record.

Scientists use field observations to determine the global average surface temperature.

The chart shows every year’s annual temperature cycle from 1880 to the present, compared to the average temperature from 1980 to 2015.

The chart shows every year’s annual temperature cycle from 1880 to the present, compared to the average temperature from 1980 to 2015.

For More Information

See NASA.gov

Credits

Please give credit for this item to:
NASA/Goddard Space Flight Center Scientific Visualization Studio

Temperature anomaly chart courtesy of NASA/Earth Observatory