White Christmas Odds Have Dropped in 58 of 77 Major US Cities, NOAA Data Shows

Most of America’s snowy cities now have worse odds of a white Christmas than they did in NOAA’s last set of climate data.

In Chicago, there’s a 33.5% chance of waking up to at least an inch of snow on the ground on Christmas morning, based on NOAA’s newest normals, which cover 1991 to 2020. The previous normals, for 1981 to 2010, put it at 37.7%. Denver went from 40.4% to 34%, and Detroit from 38% to 34.7%.

Men’s Journal looked up both sets of numbers for 77 major U.S. cities. The odds went down in 58, went up in 14 and stayed the same in five.

Spokane, Salt Lake City and Erie Dropped Below 50%

In the 1981-2010 data, Spokane, Washington; Salt Lake City; and Erie, Pennsylvania, all had better than a 50% chance of snow on the ground on Dec. 25. In the new data, all three are under 50%.

Spokane fell the most of any city we checked, from 56.9% to 48%. Salt Lake City went from 52.5% to 47.9%. Erie went from 50.3% to 45%.

Lansing, Michigan, is still just over 50%, at 50.5%, but it was at 59% before. Toledo, Ohio, lost 7.5 points. Boise, Idaho, lost 6.8 and Marquette, Michigan, lost 6.7.

A few cities went the other way. Anchorage is up 3.6 points, to 93.7%. New York City’s Central Park went from 11.6% to 13.2%, and Philadelphia and Concord, New Hampshire, are both up slightly.

How We Got These Numbers

NOAA’s definition of a white Christmas is at least 1 inch of snow on the ground on Dec. 25. If it snows that day and nothing sticks, it doesn’t count.

NOAA puts out new climate normals every 10 years. They’re 30-year averages for weather stations across the country, and for stations that measure snow depth, they show how often there was at least an inch on the ground on each day of the year. We took the main airport or city station for each place and compared Dec. 25 in the 1981-2010 and 1991-2020 normals. The data is NOAA’s. The comparison is ours.

The two periods share 20 years, 1991 to 2010. So the change comes down to the 2010s replacing the 1980s. Some stations also have shorter records than others. And this is history, not a forecast for this Christmas.

As for this year, AccuWeather thinks much of the Mountain West has a better shot than usual, we reported Sunday. And if you want to see how your state does, here are the odds for all 50.

Where Snow on Christmas Is Most Likely

Fairbanks, Alaska, is at 100%. It’s the only city on the list that had at least an inch of snow on the ground every Christmas in the data. Next are Anchorage (93.7%), International Falls, Minnesota (93.3%), Duluth, Minnesota (92.2%) and Caribou, Maine (87.2%).

Minneapolis, at 73.6%, is the largest city on the list with odds above 50%. Of the 21 cities at 50% or more, 14 are in the Upper Midwest or upstate New York.

Houston, Miami, New Orleans, Tucson and Jacksonville, Florida, are all at 0%.

White Christmas Odds for 79 US Cities

Odds of at least 1 inch of snow on the ground on Dec. 25 in NOAA’s 1981-2010 and 1991-2020 climate normals. Boston, Phoenix, Los Angeles and San Francisco aren’t on the list because their main weather stations don’t measure snow depth. Austin and San Antonio don’t have numbers for 1981-2010.