Average of the oceans between 60°S and 60°N, and land is at +0.00 °C. Each pixel compares the day's temperature with what is expected on that date. Spin the globe, touch where you live.
Touch a point on the globe, ocean or land, or use your location.
Sea ice viewed from above the poles, compared with the same date in a past year. Choose the year:
ice both years ice on 1982, gone today ice today, absent on 1982
Map: OISST ice concentration (≥ 15%). Figures: NSIDC Sea Ice Index, 1991-2020 normal.
Departure from normal of the water in the Niño 3.4 rectangle, measured by satellite. Above the red line (+0.5°C), it is called El Niño; below the blue line (−0.5°C), La Niña. In between, the Pacific is neutral.
Picture a strip of ocean along the equator, from Indonesia (on the left) to Peru (on the right), nearly 19,000 km. Each horizontal line is a snapshot of that strip. The snapshots are stacked: one year ago at the top, today at the bottom. When red spreads to the right as you go down, El Niño is taking hold. The white frame marks the thermometer rectangle.
The thermometer's official three-month rolling average (NOAA's « ONI » index). Each bar is a season: red for El Niño, blue for La Niña. An episode is official only after five consecutive seasons beyond the threshold. Major episodes are labelled.