This article has been reviewed according to Science X's editorial process and policies. Editors have highlighted the following attributes while ensuring the content's credibility: The central north Amazon, with extensive areas of high forest cover, natural savannas and vast, important Indigenous territories, was not previously considered the area most affected by climate change. However, this region, which is considered critical to Amazonia's cultural and biodiversity wealth, has unexpectedly found itself at the forefront of rapid growth in climate extremes, a new study reveals.
Findings published today in Communications Earth & Environment identify Amazonia as experiencing rapid growth in extreme temperatures and water stress—with 10% of the basin, an area of more than 700,000 square kilometers (270,000 square miles), larger than Afghanistan, witnessing increases in extreme dry-season temperatures of at least 0.75°C a decade and more than 3.22°C since 1981. The findings reveal that climate extremes in the Amazon have been worsening over the past 43 years. These changes do not appear in assessments of average Amazon temperatures, which are rising at 0.21°C a decade and are in line with average global warming.
With the El Niño of 2026 expected to be the largest in living memory, the Amazon might suffer from extremely high temperatures and drought just two years after the last major drought in 2024. Scientists fear that if these rapid increases in extreme climate events continue, they could push the Amazon past critical thresholds. The discoveries are among the findings of a study led by researchers at Lancaster University, in partnership with WWF UK and an international team of more than 50 scientists, shedding new light on climate extremes within the Amazon.
Their paper provides an up-to-date, comprehensive assessment of Amazonia's changing climate across more than four decades and at high resolution for the entire biome. Climate extremes are responsible for some of the most harmful climate-linked impacts on nature and people, driving increased mortality, losses of forest species and damage to ecosystems. In the Amazon, recent exceptionally hot or dry periods have led to extensive forest fires, large-scale animal and tree deaths, as well as impacts on human health from heat and air pollution.
By dividing the Amazon into 11-km (7-mile) cells and using high-resolution temperature and rainfall data from sources that combine information from satellites and local weather stations, the research team was able to identify dry seasons for each area of the Amazon. Using this, as well as a new measure of water deficit that accounts for the effects of temperature on water loss, the researchers modeled temperature changes and water stress across the entire Amazon from 1981 to 2023. Temperature and water deficit were recorded as averages across the dry season or the entire hydrological year (dry and wet seasons combined).
The rate of climate change was assessed in two different ways. First, the authors used the "central tendency," the most commonly used measure to date, which emphasizes average rates of temperature and water deficit change across all years. Second, the authors used "extreme tendency," which emphasizes the most exceptional years.
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