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Wednesday starts damp in East Anglia and the south eastern corner. Elsewhere there are scattered showers but it is mostly dry. Through the rest of the day much of the country has sunny spells but isolated showers continue. This afternoon cloud will thicken in the north west.

Arpege 00z, forecast temperatures, 15:30 GMT Tue 13th March

Temperatures range from 6C (42F) in Scotland to 11C (52F) in the south. See the rainfall and precipitation type radar for the latest view.

Tonight starts dry but later on outbreaks of rain spread across Northern Ireland and into south western England. In the east clear spells lead to a patchy frost.

Tomorrow heavy outbreaks of rain affect Northern Ireland, Wales and south western England. Central and eastern counties will be mostly cloudy and there may be some drizzly rain. Gales are expected in the west.

Through Thursday patchy outbreaks of rain and strong winds spread into the north. Showery conditions follow into southern and central regions.

Beast from the East 2.0

As we head towards the weekend high pressure builds to the northeast of the UK and bitterly cold Siberian air pushes westwards across continental Europe. The pattern is very similar to the one which brought the late February freeze hence the term "Beast from the East 2.0".

Most computer model runs show the upper level cold pool of air reaching the UK during Saturday. However it is narrower than the late February one so there is less margin for error and that leads to reduced forecast confidence. If the core of the cold air is as little as one hundred miles further north than most computer models are predicting the worst conditions could miss areas south of London.  

The DWD ICON precipitation type forecast chart below is for Saturday afternoon. In general terms the risk of snow looks to be highest in central and eastern Britain this weekend.

ICON 00z, forecast precipitation, 15:00 GMT Sat 17th March

Next week

Bitterly cold weather is forecast to continue through Sunday and the early part of next week. Despite it being the second half of March daytime temperatures could struggle to rise above 0C (32F).

By the middle of next week high pressure probably becomes centred to the west of the UK with a north or northeasterly flow keeping it cold. Beyond that temperatures begin to recover as the high pressure pushes in from the west and the upper level cold pool of air dissipates.

GFS 00z, 500hPa and surface pressure, 00:00 GMT Mon 19th March

Spring forecast

The TWO seasonal forecast covering the meteorological spring (March, April, May) has been issued. The monthly update for March is also online.

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16 day GEFS ensembles at a glance

Unsettled weather is shown in the short term but then it becomes drier. A small number of runs bring back very cold conditions. View latest GEFS.