The Spread

Was the forecast right for Washington on Sat Aug 1?

Washington, District of Columbia · daily high temperature in °C · forecasts from each model's archived runs, verified against the ECMWF IFS analysis

5 days out, 7 models put Washington's Sat Aug 1 high anywhere from 30° to 33°; by the final call the field had settled to a median of 32°. The day verified at 32° against the ECMWF IFS analysis, with 0.3 mm of precipitation — drizzle.

ECMWF landed closest, off by 0.1°. ICON ran 2° cold.

5 days out the models said 30–33; it hit 32. ECMWF led (off 0.1°C); ICON ran 2°C cold.
The shareable card for this receipt — what this page looks like pasted into a thread.

What every model said, at every lead

Daily-high calls for Sat Aug 1 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 Washington scoreboard shows them, labelled.

Lead AIFSAIGFSECMWFGEMGFSICONUKMO Range
5d · 2026-07-27 31° 30° 31° 31° 32° 31° 33° 30–33°
4d · 2026-07-28 31° 30° 30° 30° 33° 30° 30° 30–33°
3d · 2026-07-29 32° 30° 35° 31° 35° 32° 32° 30–35°
2d · 2026-07-30 32° 30° 34° 33° 34° 33° 33° 30–34°
1d · 2026-07-31 32° 30° 35° 36° 33° 33° 32° 30–36°
0d · 2026-08-01 32° 30° 32° 34° 33° 30° 32° 30–34°
actual 32°

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 Washington — 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 ECMWF IFS analysis (temperature_2m_max). Archive depth varies by city; receipts exist only for dates the archive watched arrive.