On Thursday, May 21, NOAA will hold a news conference at its Aircraft Operations Center in Lakeland, Florida, at 11:00 a.m. EDT to announce its official 2026 Atlantic Hurricane Season Outlook, the agency’s annual prediction of how active the coming storm season will be. Early forecasts from competing agencies, including Colorado State University and Tropical Storm Risk, are already calling for a somewhat below-normal season, with developing El Niño conditions expected to increase wind shear across the tropical Atlantic and suppress storm formation. But before the media takes NOAA’s numbers at face value and the inevitable “busier-than-normal season” headlines roll in, it’s worth asking: how good is NOAA actually at this? A look at 26 years of NOAA’s May seasonal outlooks versus what actually happened reveals a more nuanced picture; the agency hits its own stated forecast range roughly 69% of the time on named storms and hurricanes, just shy of its self-declared 70% confidence target, with a notable tendency to miss badly in the most extreme seasons, and a historical bias toward under-forecasting activity when the Atlantic is running hot.
Overall hit rate: NOAA’s May outlooks land within their stated range for named storms roughly 17 of 25 years; about 68%, just shy of their own 70% confidence target. The hurricane count accuracy is similar. That said, NOAA aims for a range (not a point forecast), so some “hits” are easier than others in wide-range years.
The big misses:
- 2005 was the most extreme failure — NOAA forecast 12–15 named storms; 28 formed, including a record 15 hurricanes. Katrina and Wilma made it a historically catastrophic season.
- 2020 was another blowout — the season blew past the forecast (30 named storms vs. a predicted 13–19), exhausting the alphabetical list for the second time ever.
- 2006 went the other direction — NOAA forecast an active season (13–16 storms) following 2005’s record activity, but El Niño suppressed the season to just 10 named storms and 5 hurricanes.
- 2013 was also a notable underperformance year — the forecast called for 13–20 storms but only 14 formed, and just 2 became hurricanes (the lowest since 1982).
Systematic bias: Research on NOAA’s seasonal outlooks found that forecasts for named storms have tended to run low on average, and that May outlooks have sometimes not verified within the outlook ranges at the target rate of 70%. In other words, NOAA has historically been more likely to under-forecast activity than over-forecast it, which matters given the trend of record-breaking seasons since 2017.
The direction call: Even when the exact numbers miss, NOAA generally gets the character of the season right, calling above-normal, near-normal, or below-normal correctly most of the time. That directional skill has improved over the 25-year period.
Year-by-year verdict — did actual named storms and hurricanes fall within NOAA’s forecast range?
For 2025, NOAA forecasted a 60% chance of an above-normal season with 13–19 named storms and 6–10 hurricanes — a somewhat more conservative range than 2024’s blockbuster outlook. 2025 is highlighted with a ★. It was a “hit” year for NOAA because the season produced 13 named storms and five hurricanes, falling within the predicted ranges for named storms, hurricanes, and major hurricanes. Source: National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration
What made 2025 interesting was the story behind the numbers: despite a below-average number of named storms and hurricanes, the season had an above-normal accumulated cyclone energy rating of 130.8 units, and three Category 5 hurricanes formed; the second most of any year on record. So NOAA got the count right, but the intensity distribution was extreme. Tropical storms and hurricanes during the 2025 season were 50% more challenging to predict compared to average.
We’ll soon learn what they think about 2026.
