Matt Lanza

In brief: Today marks Houston’s first morning of autumn with a low temperature of 65 degrees, so we declare it to be Fall Day 2026! Enjoy the comfortable morning. Hot weather is going to continue however, with highs in the 90s for several days and returning humidity next week. There may be something cooler on the horizon though. We explain.

Happy Fall Day!

Eric willed it yesterday. It is officially Fall Day in Houston! Our morning low is at least 65 degrees. We’ll see if the official low comes in at 65 or 64. Either way, we did it! The last time it was this cool in Houston was May 12th!

The morning should be lovely, so we hope you can enjoy it. And both this evening and tomorrow morning should be lovely as well!

Today and the weekend

We can partially thank Hurricane Isaias for the drier air we’re experiencing now. The dewpoint hit 57° at Bush Airport yesterday afternoon for only the second time since May. There is some chance we drop under than level this afternoon too. But the flow coming out of the northeast this time of year will do that, and a hurricane to our east only tends to enhance things a bit. Bottom line: It’s modestly comfortable for a change, albeit hot.

How hot? Look for highs in the low 90s today through Sunday. We could even see a few mid-90s on Sunday afternoon, along with slightly higher humidity. Otherwise, it looks sunny during the day and tolerable at night with lows in the 60s to near 70 by Sunday morning.

Early next week

The forecast for next week has been one that just makes you want to scream into a void this time of year. Forecast temperatures are generally up about 5 to 7 degrees from just a few days ago, as we delay the next push of cooler air to maybe next weekend. This means the front half of next week looks warm and humid. Highs will be around 90 or in the low 90s, along with a chance of some showers Monday or Tuesday.

Later next week

The remnants of Pacific Hurricane Simon will move into parts of West Texas and the Plains on Tuesday and get absorbed into what was supposed to be our first true fall cold front next week. Instead, this will keep Houston on the warmer side of the front into late week. This keeps us warm to hot and humid with continued highs near 90 or in the low 90s, lows in the 70s, and high humidity.

It gets much more interesting later in the week. The front will initially stall out to our north and west pushing a surge of moisture again across interior Texas, while keeping us on the weaker side of things with just some showers. Modeling is actually in somewhat decent agreement on that front getting blasted to the southeast sometime on Saturday, which would usher in our first chance at highs in the 70s and lows in the 50s, with crisp autumn air. We’re going to be skeptical about this until we’re 2 or 3 days out, but this is definitely the most interesting signal we’ve had all autumn. Time will tell.

In brief: A warmer and sunnier stretch of weather should await the Houston area this week, albeit with lower humidity levels. The tropics are not a concern for us at this time, with any Gulf tropical system likely staying well to our south and east. We turn hotter and more humid this weekend and early next week.

I don’t know if Sunday was the unofficial first fall day in Houston, but the weather behaved that way to an extent. Overcast skies, some light rain and drizzle, and the hangover of a disappointing sports week seemed to make it so. Our high temperature yesterday was 81°, the coolest daytime high since July 14th, when we only hit 79°. This type of weather won’t last, however, as we move into something of a more typical warm autumn setup for the rest of this week.

Today

We have some lingering clouds this morning. And those clouds may be a bit stubborn, especially south and east of Houston. There will continue to be a shower chance to the southeast too with the cool front sitting just offshore. But overall we’ll call today partly cloudy to perhaps eventually mostly sunny, with highs likely bouncing back into the mid-80s.

Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday

As of now we expect all three days to be generally partly cloudy to mostly sunny. Highs will probably be in the upper 80s. Morning lows may not be too bad on Tuesday, with a chance that some places outside of Beltway 8 drop into the 60s.

Daytimes will be hot with those upper-80s, but the humidity levels will be less oppressive and more typical for October. There could be some showers, especially by Wednesday or Thursday, and especially south and east of Houston each afternoon.

Tropics & late week through the weekend

I wrote about the tropical disturbance in the southwest Gulf and Bay of Campeche yesterday at The Eyewall. I’ll have another update on that later today or tonight.

But the short takeaway is that we should not need to worry much about this system here in Texas. With a front draped offshore, and general southwest to northeast flow pattern, whatever happens there, be it a slopfest of moisture or a stronger tropical storm or hurricane will likely be carried to our east.

This is also well reflected in the model forecast of precipitation anomalies, which you can see over the next 7 to 10 days will likely end up well above normal south and east of our area.

So for Houston, this means that we will probably continue with these seasonably warm temperatures that may gradually trend to more unseasonably warm as we go toward the weekend and next week. We’ll probably see the humidity return late this week as well. This time, however, it does look at a front or fronts will break things up sometime next week. We’re beginning to see the pace of fronts slowly increase, which should mean that any higher humidity periods should be shorter-lived than they have been since September.

In brief: A humidity front pushed through overnight, which will allow today to be significantly less humid and a couple degrees cooler. Humidity does return heading toward next week. While we are continuing to track a possible cold front later next week, confidence remains quite low in what it will actually do for the Houston area, other than lowering high temperatures a bit.

Just as a reminder, in case you missed it, we did make an important comment about hurricane season in Texas yesterday. We also have big app update news!

On to the forecast.

Today

Do you feel less humidity today? You should. A weak little boundary pushed in out of the north and east overnight, and with perhaps the exception of the extreme south and west parts of the area, it should be noticeably less humid today. Dewpoints are running about 5 to 10 degrees lower than this same time yesterday, meaning it feels that much more comfortable.

It will remain hot for sure, so look for highs in the low-90s. Thankfully not as hot as yesterday’s 97 degrees. But that humidity will make it feel far less painful regardless.

Weekend

The humidity will slowly return this weekend, especially on Sunday. But otherwise, it’ll be more of the same: low 90s, maybe a few mid 90s, and sun and clouds. Rain chances, while not zero look to remain fairly low.

Early to mid next week

The late summer party continues early next week, with heat and a slight chance of a storm on Monday. By Tuesday, a cold front is going to work across part of the state. Our modeling confidence drops off beyond that.

Mid to late next week

Either the front is going to stall west of Houston keeping us warm and humid (80s) with thunderstorm chances. Or the front is going to slowly push through the Houston area bringing in less humid and pleasant weather with thunderstorm chances.

Let’s diagnose this a little further.

If you look at the European ensemble’s probability of highs near 90 degrees, you’d see Houston generally running at 70 to 90 percent odds most days through Tuesday. By Wednesday, those odds drop to 50 to 70 percent, Thursday’s odds are 20 to 50 percent, and Friday’s odds (shown here) drop to about 10 to 30 percent.

This is the under the hood element of the models we will look at to say, “Alright, you’re forecasting a certain value, but what does it actually mean the probability of X, Y, or Z is?” In this case, we have a decent signal that the odds of 90 degree heat are dropping through later next week. So, we at least can say that with some confidence. Will we get the full-frontal experience (rated G for Great)? That remains TBD. At this time, models want to keep our precipitable water levels pretty elevated into next weekend, which I would say is a proxy for higher humidity.

So sitting here today, I would expect declining temps but maybe not necessarily declining humidity, at least not substantially so later next week. That said, eventually one of these things is going to break through and allow lows in the 60s or 50s. It’s a matter of when, not if, and there’s still at least some chance next week’s front is the one. I’m just not terribly confident in that today.

At the least, we should all see a bit of rain next week, although the highest totals will probably stay toward Hill Country and North Texas.

We will have more on all this Monday!

In brief: After some locally heavy rain south of Houston on Thursday, we begin to revert back to strong late summer heat with mid to upper 90s back in action this weekend through early next week. Maybe we can disrupt the party a bit later next week, but it does not exactly look cool.

As Eric properly called yesterday, rain did impact much of the area south of I-10. A few locations picked up as much as 2 to 3 inches of rain, with the “official” big winner being a gauge along Cloud Bayou just south of Santa Fe which saw 2.68 inches.

Yesterday’s 88 degrees was the least hot day at Hobby Airport since September 1st, when we only hit 87 degrees. Congrats to those that saw the rain, as today and the next several days will see less of it, along with plenty of heat.

Today

Shower chances today will not be zero, but they will be highest well south of the Houston area, down toward Corpus Christi and South Texas. We will likely tack on somewhere between 4 to 7 degrees from yesterday’s high temperatures, pushing us back to the mid-90s with sun and clouds.

Weekend

We’ll continue to see low-grade rain chances persist this weekend, while the vast majority of the area will continue with a mix of sun, clouds, and high heat for late September. Highs will be in the mid-90s with a few upper-90s peppered about. This will begin to bump up against record highs which are generally 98 to 100 this time of September.

Early next week

The heat should peak around Monday or Tuesday in Houston with mid to upper 90s likely. The record highs of 100 will be safe, but barely. Storm chances may increase some later Monday or especially Tuesday as a cool front gets into North Texas. Unfortunately, it falls short of making it to Houston but having it in the neighborhood should mean we are vulnerable to some showers or storms, especially northwest of Houston. That said, don’t expect a soaking for most of the area.

Later next week

The heat may attempt to relax a bit here, nudging back into the low to mid 90s. Rain chances don’t appear especially high at this time. Overall, it will feel more like June than September for the foreseeable future. One day we will have more positive news for real!