Strong to Super El Nino 2026 Continues to Strengthen

Climate Impact Company Weekly ENSO Climate Diagnostics

Issued: Wednesday September 16, 2026

Highlight: Strong to Super El Nino 2026 continues to strengthen.

Discussion: The NEW relative Nino34 SSTA index jumped to +2.0C last week and is nearing the +2.25C Super El Nino threshold (Fig. 1). The conventional Nino34 index passed the Super El Nino threshold several weeks ago. El Nino continues to intensify. The latest multi-variate ENSO index (MEI) rose slightly to +2.5 in August qualifying as a Super El Nino global climate. Certainly, the Super El Nino climate has contributed to the lack of hurricanes in the North Atlantic basin. Interestingly, past super El Nino episodes have tendency to level-off on intensity during OCT/NOV/DEC (Fig. 2). El Nino 2026 has the strongest MEI signature of the Super El Nino events this century and is forecast to continue strengthening during the next several months peaking in December (Fig. 3). Most dynamic and statistical models suggest Super El Nino 2026-27 may weaken faster than previous similar episodes.

Fig. 1: The 12-week monitor of the Nino SSTA regions indicates strengthening Strong to Super El Nino.

Fig. 2: Multi-variate ENSO index for JUL/AUG 2026 is the strongest of 4 Super El Nino events of the past 50 years.

Fig. 3: The IRI/LDEO collection of dynamic and statistical Nino34 SSTA forecasts.