Germany’s winter 2025/2026 turned out to be milder, drier and sunnier than the long‑term average. The German Meteorological Service (DWD) announced this in Offenbach on Friday. The coldest period of the season was in January, with the northern and northeastern regions staying cold the longest before a clear warming trend set in during the last decade of February, signalling a pre‑spring finish.
The provisional mean temperature was 1.8 °C, 1.6 °C above the 1961‑1990 reference period, making it the 15th consecutive winter in a row with a positive temperature anomaly. Total precipitation averaged around 135 litres per square metre-roughly 75 % of the usual amount. The northeast of Germany received especially little rainfall, usually below 100 l m⁻². Despite the overall dryness, parts of northern Germany recorded the heaviest snowfall since 2010 or 2012.
Sunshine time reached about 180 hours, an increase of roughly 18 % over the target. This was largely due to December, the second sunniest month since 1951, and to a bright January, while February was comparatively cloudy. The lowest temperature nationwide was measured in Oberstdorf on 6 January at -21.7 °C; by the end of the winter, the forecast predicted maximum temperatures around +20 °C.