2025 is poised to be the joint-second warmest year on record, alongside 2023, according to new data from the Copernicus Climate Change Service (C3S).
Both this year and 2023 sit behind 2024, however, which remains the warmest year in the C3S database.
November 2025 was the third-warmest on record, C3S noted, with average global surface air temperatures of 14.02°C, which is 0.65°C above the 1991–2020 baseline for November.
It was also 0.20°C cooler than the warmest November recorded to date, in 2023, as well as being 0.08°C cooler than November 2024.
‘This monthly climate update also reveals November 2025 was the third-warmest globally, with notably warmer-than-average temperatures recorded across Northern Canada and the Arctic Ocean,’ C3S said. ‘The month was marked by a number of extreme weather events, including tropical cyclones in Southeast Asia, causing widespread, catastrophic flooding and loss of life.’
With temperatures 1.54°C above pre-industrial levels, November 2025 was the second month this year, after October, to see temperatures exceed the 1.5°C threshold.
The year to date
Looking at the 11-month period from January to November 2025, meanwhile, global average temperatures were 0.60°C above the 1991–2020 reference period and 1.48°C above the pre-industrial baseline.
These values are identical to those recorded for the full year 2023, prompting C3S to anticipate that 2025 is ‘virtually certain’ to finish as the second- or third-warmest year on record.
‘Accelerating pace of climate change’
“For November, global temperatures were 1.54°C above pre-industrial levels, and the three-year average for 2023–2025 is on track to exceed 1.5°C for the first time,” commented Samantha Burgess, strategic lead for climate, C3S.
“These milestones are not abstract – they reflect the accelerating pace of climate change and the only way to mitigate future rising temperatures is to rapidly reduce greenhouse gas emissions.”
As C3S noted, the average temperature over Europe was 5.74°C in November, which is 1.38°C above the 1991-2020 average for the month.
The most pronounced above-average temperatures were recorded over eastern Europe, Russia, the Balkans, and Türkiye, while northern Sweden and Finland, Iceland, along with parts of northern Italy and southern Germany, recorded below-average temperatures. Read more here.
