In brief: In today’s post we briefly discuss the ongoing ridge of high pressure dominating Houston’s weather. We also take a look at what’s happening in the Atlantic tropics (not much), and more interestingly talk about the AI model that performed exceptionally well during the 2025 Atlantic hurricane season.

Tropics update and AI model review

The short answer is that the Atlantic tropics are quiet. This is often the case for late July, when Atlantic sea surface temperatures are still warming toward their peak later this summer, and wind shear is fairly high. The other factor working against tropical storms and hurricanes at this time of year is Saharan dust, and there is plenty of it across the Atlantic basin right now. I would expect the Atlantic tropics to remain quiet through the end of June, and probably at least a week into July, if not longer.

Before moving on to the rest of today’s post, I did want to note one thing about hurricane models. Earlier this year the National Hurricane Center published its annual verification report for the 2025 Atlantic hurricane season. One of the questions this report answers concerns the performance of the various forecast models for the “track” of tropical systems. And last year there was a clear winner, Google’s DeepMind model which is based on artificial intelligence. For forecast periods of 12 hours to 4 days out, the model’s performance was better even than that of the National Hurricane Center and various consensus models. It’s quite striking.

Our friend and colleague Michael Lowry has an excellent post explaining all of this on his “Eye on the Tropics” Substack, and it’s worth a read to put the performance of this AI model into perspective. Speaking for Matt and myself, we used Google’s model as part of our suite of tools last year, and obviously will continue to do so. I’m eager to see if it is a top performer again this year.

Wednesday, Thursday, and Friday

Back in Houston, our forecast has not changed much. Or rather, at all. A fairly strong ridge of high pressure remains in control of our weather for the time being. This will bring us mostly sunny skies, humidity, and hot temperatures. Highs for the rest of this week will be in the low- to mid-90s, with plenty of humidity. Overnight lows will generally drop into the mid- to upper-70s. Rain chances are basically zero. Winds will be calm in the morning, with moderately gusty conditions (up to 20 mph) during the afternoon. And that is basically it.

Saturday and Sunday

Are we expecting much change in the weather this weekend? In short, no. Perhaps we’ll see nighttime temperatures 1 to 2 degrees warmer, but it will be difficult to notice much difference.

Next week

Our sunny and hot weather continues into next week, but by Wednesday or so, some of our forecast models are indicating a turn toward a more typical summertime pattern, with a chance of afternoon showers and thunderstorms along the sea breeze. However, when we get into these persistent high pressure patterns it can be difficult to break them, so we’re offering no guarantees here.

In brief: In today’s post we look ahead to Houston’s sunny, hot, and largely unchanging forecast. Also, since it’s going to be really sunny outside, we dive a bit deeper into the UV forecast, and why you should protect your skin.

We’ve reached peak sunshine

Sunday marked the summer solstice, the point at which the Sun reaches the highest point in the sky. For Houston this is an altitude of 84 degrees above the horizon (90 degrees is the maximum). The Sun reaches this meridian today at 1:23 pm CT. At this point it does not take long for you to burn because the ultraviolet light from the Sun is very nearly at its maximum point for a sea-level location on Earth.

Here’s what the UV forecast for this week actually looks like. If you slide the image, I’ve added some time stamps on a blown up version of the forecast. Essentially, the way to think of this is, from 10 am to 5 pm you’re getting a decent amount of sunshine. From 11 am to 4 pm you’re susceptible to sunburns fairly quickly. And from noon to 2:30 pm your skin will burn quickly without protection, within half an hour or less for many people.

For the remainder of the summer our days will slowly get shorter, and the Sun at a lower angle. But even two months from now in late August, the Sun still reaches a solar angle of 71 percent in the sky, which translates to “noon” on the graphic above in terms of Sun angle. So “extreme” UV is going to be with us for awhile. Protect yourself accordingly!

Tuesday through Friday

Sunshine will prevail for the rest of the week. We can generally expect highs in the low- to mid-90s in the city of Houston, with slightly cooler conditions closer to the coast, and slightly warmer conditions further inland. Winds will generally be light in the morning, while increasing during the afternoon hours and possibly gusting to about 20 mph. Overnight lows will generally drop into the upper 70s, although Thursday and Friday may get into the mid-70s. But really, this will be a distinction without a difference. Rain chances are essentially zero.

Saturday and Sunday

Does anything change this weekend? Probably not. Oh, maybe there’s a 10 percent chance of showers by Sunday. But really, with high pressure still largely in control our forecast remains more or less the same.

Next week

It is possible, although far from guaranteed, that high pressure will start to relent a little bit at some point next week. I don’t think our temperatures will change much, but this could reintroduce something like a 20 percent chance of showers each afternoon. We shall see.

As I said above, remember your Sun protection!

In brief: After a wetter and cooler start to summer major changes are coming to Houston’s weather. Also, our days are now getting shorter!

Sunday, the summer transition day

Sunday marked the summer solstice, the day when the Sun reaches the highest point in the sky. Slowly, now, our days will start to get shorter. If you’re keeping count, today will be about two seconds shorter than Sunday. This process accelerates until the autumnal equinox, in September, by which point we are losing 1 minute, 45 seconds of daylight every 24 hours.

Sunday also marked an important transition day for our weather. Up until this point our average high temperature this month has been below 90 degrees. This is largely because, for a majority of days this June, we have received at least a smidgeon of rain. On some days, the showers have been absolute downpours. Over the last 30 days the majority of the Houston area has picked up 8 to 16 inches of rainfall, more than twice as much as normal. The clouds and rains have kept a lid on daytime highs. Some days it has been, dare I say—almost—nice outside?

That will now change abruptly, with the arrival of high pressure. Houston is unlikely to see any rainfall for at least the next seven days. And far from daytime highs in the upper 80s, we’re much more likely to see highs in the mid-90s. We are shifting from early summer, which had a good run, directly into Mid summer.

Monday through Friday

There’s really not much of a forecast to make with high pressure in control of things. High temperatures this week will, each day, reach into the mid-90s in Houston. Coastal areas will be a few degrees cooler, and inland areas a few degrees warmer. Winds will be light in the morning, with afternoon gusts reaching about 20 mph from the south.

Humidity will be high, but not quite as high as we experienced late last week. Overnight lows will generally fall into the mid- to upper 70s. Skies will be mostly sunny, but we’ll likely see some clouds during the morning hours before everything clears out. Daily rain chances will be about 10 percent, or less. In short, it will very much feel like summer in Houston.

Saturday or Sunday

Probably nothing changes. If I squint maybe there’s a slight chance of rain on Saturday or Sunday, but probably not. Highs likely remain in the mid-90s or thereabouts.

Next week

With these high pressure systems the question is always when things break down. For now, that does not seem likely before the end of June. But possibly we may see some showers return by the middle of next week. But then again, it’s just as likely as they will not. Welcome to Houston summers yall. When it’s not flooding, the heat is next level.

In brief: We are issuing a Stage 1 flood alert for Saturday due to the possibility of slow moving storms capable of producing rainfall rates of 1 to 2 inches per hour. Activity should wane this evening, with less coverage on Sunday.

After a fairly quiet start to the day, we are seeing storms firing up along an area of convergent winds near the coast. At 11 am CT these storms have formed roughly along a line from Bay City to Pearland to Clear lake to Baytown. The heaviest of these storms may briefly produce rainfall rates of 1 to 2 inches per hour.

So what will happen during the rest of today? Our high resolution modeling guidance has not been, to put it politely, great. But given the high levels of precipitable water (well above 2 inches for most of the region) we are now leaning toward a fairly active day today in terms of showers and thunderstorms. Some parts of the metro area will get hit, while others just hear distant thunder. Because some of this activity may be slow-moving, we are going to issue a Stage 1 flood alert through this evening, which indicates the possibility of street flooding.

Creeks and bayous across the Houston region are generally in good condition, so we don’t expect more than nuisance flooding (that is, streets, feeder roads, etc) for today. But this activity could definitely put a damper on outdoor activities. Beyond heavy rainfall there is the threat of thunder and lightning, but no real indication of severe weather such as damaging winds or hail.

Our expectation is that storm activity will begin to wane this evening and then should die off overnight. Rain chances should be lower on Sunday, probably in the vicinity of 20 percent. Rain chances next week will be near zero, with sunny skies and highs in the mid-90s (at least) as high pressure asserts control. So if you’re tired of the rain, its end is at hand. Just not quite yet.