NOAA Forecasts Record El Niño as Scientists Debate Climate Link

A surge of ocean heat in the tropical Pacific has pushed the US National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration to forecast a 100 percent probability of an extremely strong El Niño through December, with scientists divided over how much of the intensity traces back to climate change, according to WIRED.

NOAA's three-month rolling forecast puts the odds above 80 percent that the strong El Niño phase will persist through February, the agency's data shows. The event has already set multiple daily heat records in the eastern tropical Pacific, including a peak of 3.4 degrees Celsius above normal, WIRED reported.

How Strong Could the 2026 El Niño Get?

NOAA's October-to-December forecast projects heat in the eastern tropical Pacific could average 2.7 degrees Celsius above normal, a threshold that would surpass the 2.4-degree mark set during the 1982–1983 El Niño, according to the agency's data cited by WIRED. The outlet noted it is "not out of the question" that the three-month average could exceed 3 degrees Celsius.

El Niño forms every few years when surface waters in the eastern tropical Pacific warm above normal, shifting atmospheric circulation and, in turn, rainfall and temperature patterns worldwide. Christopher Callahan, a climate researcher at Indiana University, described the scale of this year's heat buildup as more disruptive than a typical event. "I have more questions than I have reactions," Callahan told WIRED, cautioning that the relationship between the current El Niño and global warming remains an active area of research rather than settled science.

Why Do Researchers Call El Niño and Warming 'Inextricably Linked'?

Francisco Estrada, who coordinates the Climate Change Research Program at Mexico's National Autonomous University, told WIRED that framing the debate as a choice between a "natural El Niño" and one "caused by climate change" misstates the science.

"You can't separate El Niño from global warming—they're inextricably linked."

Estrada said both the magnitude and frequency of El Niño events have increased over the past 60 years, along with greater variability in how effects are distributed across regions, according to WIRED's reporting. He argues the two processes should be studied as an interaction rather than isolated causes.

Do Climate Models Agree El Niño Is Getting Stronger?

The evidence is not uniform. WIRED reported that most climate models project El Niño's amplitude will increase as the planet warms, and paleoclimate records indicate the current period is more active than most of the last several thousand years. Callahan, however, cautioned that many of those same models struggle to accurately reproduce long-term temperature trends in the eastern tropical Pacific — a gap that complicates confidence in forecasts tying El Niño strength directly to warming.

That tension, researchers told WIRED, is why this year's event is being watched closely: an El Niño of this magnitude, layered onto a warmer baseline climate, could help scientists test whether the models' projected amplification actually shows up in real-world data.

By the Numbers

• 3.4°C — peak daily heat anomaly already recorded in the eastern tropical Pacific this year, per NOAA data cited by WIRED.
• 2.7°C — NOAA's forecast for the October–December three-month average anomaly, which would break the prior record.
• 2.4°C — the record three-month anomaly set during the 1982–1983 El Niño, the benchmark this year's event is forecast to exceed.
• 100% — NOAA's probability estimate for an extremely strong El Niño persisting through December.

What Are Scientists Still Trying to Determine?

The open questions center on mechanism rather than existence of a link. Researchers want to know whether warming oceans are directly intensifying El Niño's peak heat, whether they are instead altering its frequency or geographic footprint, and whether current climate models can be trusted to project that relationship decades into the future. Callahan's caution about model performance in the eastern tropical Pacific underscores why WIRED described the connection as a subject of active research rather than consensus.

For now, the practical takeaway from NOAA's forecast is more immediate: a Pacific Ocean running hotter than at any point in the agency's three-month record, with ripple effects on global weather patterns expected to be more forceful than in past El Niño years, according to WIRED's reporting. How much of that force originates in natural ocean cycles versus accumulated greenhouse warming is the question Estrada, Callahan and other researchers are now racing to answer using this winter's data.