A wet September starts the meteorological autumn

The Met Office has said that after the hottest summer on record with below-average rainfall and areas reaching drought status, meteorological autumn has started with a wet month and temperatures around average for many.

The UK provisionally saw 32% more rain than the long-term average in September, with a large swathe of England, Wales and Northern Ireland seeing generally seeing the wetter conditions.

Of the UK’s nations, Scotland was slightly drier, though even here still saw slightly above average rainfall, with 125.8mm or 2% more than the long-term average.

In contrast, Wales was the wettest nation in the month and had 74% more rain than average.

England and Northern Ireland also saw above average rainfall, with 102.0mm (49% more than average) and 144.6mm (65% more than average) of rain respectively. At a county level, Cumbria had its fourth wettest September in a series from 1836, and its wettest since 1950.

Dr Emily Carlisle, scientist at the Met Office said, “In a change from recent months, September brought frequent rain as a succession of low pressure systems brought frontal rain across the country for the first few weeks of the month. We’ve also seen some heavy downpours at times from thunderstorms.

“While there have been drier interludes at times, not least further south in recent days, September 2025 goes down as a wet month, with temperatures and sunshine hours generally closer to average.”

The average mean temperature for September 2025 was provisionally 12.8°C, which is slightly below the long-term meteorological average.

England, Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland were all fractions of a degree from their long-term average mean temperature. Only the Northern Isles were significantly warmer than average.

The UK’s highest daily maximum temperature during September 2025 was 27.8°C, with the lowest overnight minimum temperature of -5.0°C giving a flavour of the variable conditions that are possible in a UK autumn.