The August Bank Holiday is always the last Monday in August, although these statistics include Saturday and Sunday, to look at the whole weekend. At this time of year it can still be quite hot, although there have been few instances of this actually being the case over the Bank Holiday weekend itself. In some years the progression of Atlantic low-pressure systems have arrived by the end of August, bringing wind and rain.

Here are the warmest, coldest, wettest and windiest August Bank Holiday weekends, as provided by the Met Office National Climate Information Centre.

Warmest

Temperatures reached 31.6 °C at London Weather Centre on Saturday 25 August 2001, and more than twenty stations exceeded 30 °C on that day, mostly in the south-east and East Anglia. Saturday 25th August 1990 was also very warm in many parts.

Coldest

Numerous Scottish stations failed to get above 10 °C on Sunday 28th August 2011, the lowest maximum being 9.1 °C at Cromdale. This excludes stations 500 metres above sea level, which may be considerably colder.

There have also been numerous instances of air frost over the August Bank Holiday, most of them in Scotland, most notably in 1977 and 1982. The lowest individual reading was -3.1 °C at Kindrogan on Sunday 28 August 1977.

Wettest

On occasions 100 mm or more of rainfall has been recorded in a day. The highest 0900 GMT – 0900 GMT figure is 152.2 mm, recorded at Glendessary on Monday 31 August 1992. Widespread heavy rainfall also came from the remnants of Hurricane Charlie on Monday 25 August 1986.

Windiest

A maximum gust of 78 mph was reported at Lerwick on Monday 29 August 2005. Strong winds were also relatively widespread in 1986 and 1992.

Check your local Bank Holiday weather forecast on our website.