Winter may be getting underway in the Chicago area on Thursday, but it sure won’t feel like that for several days, and it is the polar opposite (pun intended) of the weather around Christmas in 2022.
According to the newest models from the NBC 5 Storm Team, Saturday will likely see high temperatures in the low-50s, while the mercury could rise all the way to 55 degrees on Sunday in the city.
Christmas Day will likely bring some rain to the holiday party, with a high temperature of 53 degrees.
If the Christmas Day high hits 53 degrees, it would be the seventh-warmest Christmas on record, with 1982’s balmy 64 degrees setting the record in that category.
Chicago is familiar with warm holidays in recent years, with a 57-degree high in 2019 and a 55-degree high in 2021.
On the other side of that temperature rollercoaster, Christmas in 2022 was one of the coldest on record in the city, with a high of 14 degrees. That marked the seventh-coldest Christmas on record, well behind the negative-5 degree readings experienced in 1983.
Even though 14 degrees is hardly a pleasant temperature, it was quite a bit better than the weather in the days preceding the holiday. On Dec. 23, 2022, the low temperature in Chicago was minus-8, with a wind chill of minus-42 recorded in the suburbs thanks to wind gusts that approached 60 miles per hour.
Local
The high temperature was negative-1 degree Fahrenheit two days before Christmas a year ago. Thankfully, the temperatures rebounded just a bit on Christmas Eve, with a high of 14 degrees.
Feeling out of the loop? We'll catch you up on the Chicago news you need to know. Sign up for the weekly> Chicago Catch-Up newsletter.
