Britons are enjoying a “remarkably mild” Christmas Eve as shoppers dash to buy last-minute gifts and travellers head home for the festive season.
Although conditions on Tuesday are expected to be “grey and gloomy”, it will be the warmest day of the week, with highs of up to 15C in north east Wales, according to the Met Office.
This is slightly lower than the warmest Christmas Eve on record – when a high of 15.6C was measured at Gordon Castle in Banff and in Craibstone, Aberdeenshire, in 1931.
The Midlands, north east England and north east Scotland may see some “brighter spells”, but it will be largely cloudy for most of the country, the weather service added.
In an online forecast, Met Office meteorologist Aidan McGivern said: “It’s just going to stay cloudy, a lot of low cloud covering the hills of the west, misty around the coast, drizzle here and there, particularly for north west England, and more especially western Scotland – where the rain will be persistent through the rest of the day with a strengthening south westerly wind.
“But with all of this cloud coming from the Atlantic, it is going to be a remarkably mild Christmas Eve.”
Temperatures on Christmas Day are forecast to be a little cooler than Tuesday, with highs of 13C in Plymouth and strong winds of up to 50mph forecast in the north and north west of Scotland.
Of Wednesday’s weather, the meteorologist said: “It’s patchy drizzle over hills and coasts of the West, but mostly dry elsewhere, and with lighter winds in the south and relatively mild winds, it’s not going to be a bad afternoon for getting out for a walk.
“It might not be the crisp winter’s day that a lot of people appreciate on Christmas Day, but at least it will be mostly dry and settled.
“The weather shouldn’t cause too many problems.”
The UK’s record highest temperature for Christmas Day is 15.6C, which was in Killerton, Devon, in 1920, according to Met Office data.
The chilliest Christmas on record was last year, which saw a low of 12.4C in East Malling, Kent and at Exeter airport in Devon.
