The summer of 2026 was the second-hottest officially recorded in Germany with a provisional average temperature was 19.6 degrees Celsius, the German Weather Service (DWD) reported on Monday.
"According to preliminary calculations, only the summer of the century in 2003, at 19.7 degrees, is likely to have been warmer," the DWD said.
Temperatures in the summer of 2026 were 3.3 degrees above the internationally recognized reference period of 1961 to 1990.
"What was unprecedented in 2026 was the frequency of the heat," the DWD said. Across Germany, an average of around 22 hot days with temperatures of at least 30 degrees and about five very hot days with temperatures reaching at least 35 degrees were recorded.
A new provisional German temperature record was set in Möckern-Drewitz to the west of Berlin on June 27, at 41.8 degrees.
The night of June 27-28 was also extreme. In Kubschütz near the Czech border, the temperature did not fall below 29.4 degrees, seen by the DWD as "the highest nighttime minimum ever measured in Germany."
The summer was particularly dry, with total precipitation at around 171 millimetres. The sun shone for around 779 hours, making it one of the five sunniest summers since sunshine records began in 1951.
