Global warming has accelerated significantly since around 2015, rising at 0.35°C per decade, according to a study published in Geophysical Research Letters.
Earth has entered a faster warming phase over the past decade, defying explanations tied purely to natural temperature swings. A new analysis from the Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research shows that global temperatures have increased at an estimated pace of 0.35°C per decade over the last ten years. That recent rate marks a substantial leap from the average warming pace of just under 0.2°C per decade recorded between 1970 and 2015.
The acceleration has pushed planetary warming past any comparable decade since instrumental record-keeping began in 1880, according to findings published in the scientific journal Geophysical Research Letters. Researchers evaluated five widely used global temperature datasets—NASA, NOAA, HadCRUT, Berkeley Earth, and ERA5—to test whether the trend appeared consistently across independent tracking methods.
Isolating the Long-Term Signal Across Five Datasets
Short-term climate noise often obscures underlying trends. Natural phenomena like El Niño can temporarily spike global temperatures by releasing heat from the tropical Pacific Ocean, while volcanic eruptions and solar activity can exert cooling or minor warming influences. To clear away this variability, the research team applied statistical filters to isolate the core trajectory.
The team employed two separate statistical approaches: a quadratic trend analysis to test whether the temperature curve is bending upward, and a piecewise linear model to objectively identify shifts in the warming rate. Both methods yielded the same result, showing that the acceleration became visible in data records beginning around 2013 or 2014, with the broader shift firmly established by 2015. Even after researchers adjusted for the extreme warmth driven by an El Niño event and a solar maximum during 2023 and 2024, those years remained the two warmest on record.
The authors noted that while the study was designed to detect statistical acceleration rather than assign blame, the trajectory aligns with periods of accelerated warming produced by computer-simulated climate models.
Implications for the Paris Agreement 1.5°C Threshold
The speedup in planetary temperatures carries direct consequences for international climate goals. The Paris Agreement targets a long-term limit of restricting global warming to 1.5°C above preindustrial levels. While a single hot year does not permanently cross that threshold, researchers warn that current trajectories threaten the timeline significantly.
“If the warming rate of the past 10 years continues, it would lead to a long-term exceedance of the 1.5°C limit of the Paris Agreement before 2030,”
Stefan Rahmstorf, PIK researcher and lead author of the study
While the study stops short of investigating specific drivers behind the post-2015 surge, researchers point to ongoing greenhouse gas emissions from fossil fuels as the primary suspect. Another possibility highlighted by the team is that cooling aerosols, which previously masked the true extent of global heating, may have diminished in their offsetting effect. Ultimately, as the authors emphasize, future warming rates will depend entirely on how swiftly global carbon dioxide emissions are driven down to zero.