Was the forecast right for Chicago on Sun Oct 18?
Chicago, Illinois · daily high temperature in °C · forecasts from each model's archived runs, verified against the MDW observations
14 days out, 4 models put Chicago's Sun Oct 18 high anywhere from 11° to 17°;by the final call, the day before, the field had settled to a median of 16°. The day verified at 18° against the MDW observations — clear.
GFS landed closest, off by 0.3°. ICON ran 2° cool.
What every model said, at every lead
Daily-high calls for Sun Oct 18 as each model's runs approached it — the last archived run per day. NBM and The Spread's own blend are consensus products and stay out of these ranges and rankings; the Chicago scoreboard shows them, labelled.
| Lead | AIFS | AIGFS | ECMWF | GEM | GFS | ICON | UKMO | Range |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 15d · 2026-10-03 | — | 18° | — | — | 22° | — | — | 18–22° |
| 14d · 2026-10-04 | 13° | 11° | 17° | — | 11° | — | — | 11–17° |
| 13d · 2026-10-05 | 11° | 19° | 14° | — | 13° | — | — | 11–19° |
| 12d · 2026-10-06 | 9° | 12° | 11° | — | 5° | — | — | 5–12° |
| 11d · 2026-10-07 | 20° | 10° | 10° | — | 12° | — | — | 10–20° |
| 10d · 2026-10-08 | 6° | 18° | 11° | — | 13° | — | — | 6–18° |
| 9d · 2026-10-09 | 12° | 12° | 14° | 11° | 11° | — | — | 11–14° |
| 8d · 2026-10-10 | 15° | 10° | 16° | 11° | 10° | — | — | 10–16° |
| 7d · 2026-10-11 | 17° | 15° | 16° | 16° | 16° | — | — | 15–17° |
| 6d · 2026-10-12 | — | 17° | 18° | 16° | 16° | 17° | 18° | 16–18° |
| 5d · 2026-10-13 | 16° | 17° | 16° | 15° | 18° | 18° | 17° | 15–18° |
| 4d · 2026-10-14 | 17° | 16° | 16° | 14° | 17° | 17° | 17° | 14–17° |
| 3d · 2026-10-15 | 16° | 16° | 16° | 14° | 17° | 16° | 17° | 14–17° |
| 2d · 2026-10-16 | 16° | 16° | 16° | 14° | 17° | 15° | 17° | 14–17° |
| 1d · 2026-10-17 | 16° | 16° | 16° | 16° | 17° | 16° | 17° | 16–17° |
| actual | 18° |
Read it honestly
This is one date, not a league table. A model can win a day it deserved to lose; rankings only mean something over a window. For that, see which model has been most accurate in Chicago — or every city The Spread scores.
Forecasts are what each model's archived runs said at the time, captured at The Spread's sweep times — never reconstructed after the fact. Truth is the MDW observations. The actual values are the ones in hand when this receipt was settled, usually 2 days after the date; a correction published after that is not carried into it. Archive depth varies by city; receipts exist only for dates the archive watched arrive.