Here’s the exact date London could get rain for the first time since June 22

| Senior science and technology reporter Published August 17, 2026 4:09pm Updated August 17, 2026 4:12pm Get used to summers like this, one weather expert told Metro (Picture: James Veysey/Shutterstock) Do you remember what colour your umbrella is? Granted, that’s if you even remember what an umbrella is at this point. London hasn’t seen any proper rain since June 22 when weather stations recorded what is, by this summer’s standards, a whopping 10mm of it. Since then, back-to-back heatwaves with just the odd dribble of rain have turned parks into tinderboxes, made streets stink and left Londoners unable to sleep. But Met Office deputy chief forecaster, Mike Silverstone, says it’s time to dust off your raincoat – the Great British summer we love to hate is here. Well, here for a little bit. When will it rain in London? There will be ‘meaningful’ rain late Tuesday into the early hours of Wednesday and again on Thursday, Silverstone told Metro. ‘Thursday will be a day of heavy showers across much of the UK, while some of these will be heavy, some areas will miss them altogether,’ he added. By the middle of this week, many places that have largely missed out on rain recently are likely to see some wet weather. ☔ Expect outbreaks of showers, with a risk of thunder and some intense downpours mixed in. ⛈️🌧️How much rain will your local area experience👇 pic.twitter.com/80zlU3eExj— Met Office (@metoffice) August 17, 2026 ‘As some of these showers could be intense, there is a chance of some surface water flooding as the rain falls on very dry and hard ground. ‘There will be fewer showers on Friday before the weather turns drier once again through the weekend. ‘Further ahead, next week is forecast to see further rain with low pressure back in charge of the weather.’ Thursday’s London forecast says to expect rain from 11am to 9pm, with as high as a 60% chance of precipitation at 4pm. Latest London news This percentage doesn’t mean it’ll rain 60% of that hour, or that 60% of London will be drenched. Those blue smudges next to the clouds are ‘rain’, in case you forgot (Picture: Met Office) Rather, based on dozens of models, it’s the likelihood that there will be at least 0.1mm or so of rain in a given area at that time. Sometimes, it can mean a short, intense downpour that only lasts a few seconds, or just lightly spitting for an hour. How much will it rain, though? Either will be a welcome respite for a city where thermometers reached 38.1°C earlier this month during the fifth heatwave of the year (so far). The blistering temperature was recorded in Kew Gardens, making 2026 the year with the most 37-degrees-or-above days on record in the UK. But with a sixth heatwave of the year (again, so far) just weeks away, meteorologist Jim NR Dale says we should all get used to long spells of hot and dry weather. ‘The Tuesday-Wednesday rain won’t amount to much, about 4mm max in the south and Midlands and 1mm in London,’ the British Weather Services founder told Metro. Parched parks are now a common sight (Picture: Vuk Valcic/ZUMA Press Wire/Shutterstock) ‘Useless in the grand scheme of things.’ There are a fair few reasons why this summer has been such a scorcher, such as Europe being encased in a ‘heat dome’ of stubborn high pressure. A ‘super El Niño’, a naturally-occurring weather system that scrambles where oceanic water is blown around, is also partly to blame. While the pattern is already bad enough, this year’s is supercharged by climate change, Dale previously told Metro. But this year won’t be the last of the heat. Londoners should expect ‘long, dry summers and long, wet winters’ to be the new norm, Dale said. ‘A Mediterranean climate in all but name,’ he added, ‘and yes, burning fossil fuels is the culprit.’ Get in touch with our news team by emailing us at webnews@metro.co.uk. For more stories like this, check our news page. Arrow MORE: Car washes and private swimming pools could be banned to combat drought Arrow MORE: The worst UK cities to be a landlord in 2026 Arrow MORE: Charing Cross and Waterloo East reopened after engineering works News Updates Stay on top of the headlines with daily email updates.