UK weather: Britain set for 'hottest April ever' as bookies slash odds

UK weather: Britain set for 'hottest April ever' as bookies slash odds Newspoint | 08/04/2025 21:39:19

Bookies have slashed the odds of this month being the hottest April in history. It is now 2/1 April will be the warmest and 6/4 the driest on record. The highest April temperature ever recorded in the UK was 29.4C [85F] on April 16, 1949, when Clement Attlee was prime minister and a loaf of bread cost 11p, a pound of butter was 20p, and a dozen eggs was priced at 26p.

It is now a distinct possibility a record that has stood untouched for 76 years - a year after the NHS was founded - will now fall. Cal Gildart of Ladbrokes said: "With the UK swapping showers for sunshine to kick off April, not to mention the forecast showing bright days for the foreseeable, we've had to cut the odds on this month being the hottest on record." Forecasters expect temperatures to race above 20C (68F), with most of the UK basking in warm and dry weather.

Friday was the hottest day of the year so far when 24C (75F) was recorded in Otterbourne, Hampshire.

Temperatures of 21C (69.8F) are expected on Friday and Saturday, making much of the UK warmer than Marbella, Ibiza, Mykonos, and Los Angeles.

The outlook has seen the odds of this month being the driest April on record slashed from 3/1 and bookmakers expecting a flood of bets on it being the hottest in history.

The April record came tantalisingly close to being smashed in 2018 when temperatures reached 29.1C (84.4F) in London. The heatwave was caused by warm air off the coast of Portugal being dragged up towards the UK by an area of low pressure over the Atlantic and high pressure over western Europe.

The Met Office said the outlook between April 12 and 21 was for temperatures to be above normal before a "gradual change to a more unsettled weather regime thereafter".

The average temperature for this time of year is around 12C [54F].

The prospect of another record tumbling for the second successive month comes after boffins said England witnessed its brightest March since records began in 1910, with 185.8 hours of sunshine recorded across 31 days, beating the previous record of 171.7 hours in 1929.