The Spread

Was the forecast right for Salt Lake City on Tue Aug 11?

Salt Lake City, Utah · daily high temperature in °C · forecasts from each model's archived runs, verified against ERA5

14 days out, 4 models put Salt Lake City's Tue Aug 11 high anywhere from 28° to 38°; by the final call the field had settled to a median of 35°. ERA5 says the day verified at 36° with 0.5 mm of precipitation — drizzle.

ECMWF landed closest, off by 0.2°. AIFS ran 3° cold.

14 days out the models said 28–38; it hit 36. ECMWF led (off 0.2°C); AIFS ran 3°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 Tue Aug 11 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 Salt Lake City scoreboard shows them, labelled.

Lead AIFSAIGFSECMWFGEMGFSICONUKMO Range
15d · 2026-07-27 28° 34° 28–34°
14d · 2026-07-28 28° 34° 32° 38° 28–38°
13d · 2026-07-29 32° 34° 38° 39° 32–39°
12d · 2026-07-30 32° 28° 36° 36° 28–36°
11d · 2026-07-31 31° 25° 36° 38° 25–38°
10d · 2026-08-01 32° 28° 34° 39° 28–39°
9d · 2026-08-02 29° 30° 32° 34° 38° 29–38°
8d · 2026-08-03 32° 33° 33° 35° 38° 32–38°
7d · 2026-08-04 33° 33° 36° 34° 39° 33–39°
6d · 2026-08-05 31° 34° 34° 33° 39° 36° 36° 31–39°
5d · 2026-08-06 32° 33° 37° 35° 38° 35° 37° 32–38°
4d · 2026-08-07 32° 34° 36° 33° 38° 36° 36° 32–38°
3d · 2026-08-08 33° 34° 36° 35° 38° 36° 35° 33–38°
2d · 2026-08-09 33° 34° 35° 36° 38° 35° 35° 33–38°
1d · 2026-08-10 33° 34° 35° 35° 37° 35° 35° 33–37°
0d · 2026-08-11 33° 35° 36° 36° 36° 34° 34° 33–36°
actual 36°

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 Salt Lake City — 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 ERA5 reanalysis (temperature_2m_max). Archive depth varies by city; receipts exist only for dates the archive watched arrive.