The Spread

Was the forecast right for Denver on Sun Aug 16?

Denver, Colorado · daily high temperature in °C · forecasts from each model's archived runs, verified against the ECMWF IFS analysis

13 days out, 4 models put Denver's Sun Aug 16 high anywhere from 22° to 33°; by the final call the field had settled to a median of 28°. The ECMWF IFS analysis says the day verified at 29° with 0.8 mm of precipitation — drizzle.

ICON landed closest, off by 0.3°. GEM ran 4° cold.

13 days out the models said 22–33; it hit 29. ICON led (off 0.3°C); GEM ran 4°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 Sun Aug 16 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 Denver scoreboard shows them, labelled.

Lead AIFSAIGFSECMWFGEMGFSICONUKMO Range
15d · 2026-08-01 28° 38° 28–38°
14d · 2026-08-02 29° 27° 37° 27–37°
13d · 2026-08-03 22° 33° 27° 33° 22–33°
12d · 2026-08-04 27° 28° 24° 36° 24–36°
11d · 2026-08-05 27° 26° 26° 33° 26–33°
10d · 2026-08-06 24° 28° 27° 33° 24–33°
9d · 2026-08-07 22° 28° 26° 34° 22–34°
8d · 2026-08-08 28° 29° 24° 28° 31° 24–31°
7d · 2026-08-09 29° 26° 26° 27° 32° 26–32°
6d · 2026-08-10 27° 28° 24° 31° 31° 31° 24–31°
5d · 2026-08-11 28° 30° 28° 27° 33° 31° 27° 27–33°
4d · 2026-08-12 26° 28° 25° 28° 33° 27° 28° 25–33°
3d · 2026-08-13 28° 28° 25° 28° 32° 30° 27° 25–32°
2d · 2026-08-14 28° 28° 26° 27° 31° 31° 29° 26–31°
1d · 2026-08-15 28° 28° 26° 27° 31° 30° 30° 26–31°
0d · 2026-08-16 27° 28° 27° 24° 31° 28° 30° 24–31°
actual 29°

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 Denver — 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.