Jackson Hole just experienced one of its warmest and driest Novembers on record, with a persistent weather pattern throughout most of the month that left a Ridge of High pressure sitting over a good portion of the Western United States and the Northern Rockies. Few storm systems were able to penetrate this Ridge, the storms that did mainly swung southward from the Pacific, across the Southwestern U.S. and Northern Rockies.

The result for Jackson Hole was little snow and temperatures too warm to keep the snow-guns going to make much man-made snow. Not a good combination for a ski resort town. Fortunately, a good stream of moisture in a Northwesterly flow starting the first week of December helped get things back up closer to normal in the mountains, at least. Unfortunately, warmer temps again by the second week of December will negate the snow down low.

In this post I’ll review the temperature, snowfall, and precipitation numbers from this past November and compare them to the historic averages and records.

Record Warm Temperature

There are different metrics you can use to determine how warm or how cold a month was: 1) Average monthly high temperature, 2) Average monthly low temperature, 3) Mean monthly temperature, which is the average of the high and low for the month.

All data reported here comes from the official instruments at the Jackson Climate Station.

1) November 2025’s average high temperature for the month was 48.4 degrees Fahrenheit. That is 8 degrees warmer than the long-term average high in November of 40 degrees. The warmest day of the month was 64 degrees on November 3rd.

There have been five other Novembers with warmer average high temperatures than this past November’s 48.4 F: 1999 (51.6 F), 1954 (49.5 F), 1953 (48.5 F), 1949 (48.9 F), 1939 (50.8 F).

November 1999 had the warmest average high temperature on record (51.6 F). The coldest November on record was in 2022, just three years ago, with an average high for the month of 27.7 degrees.

2) November 2025’s average low temperature for the month was 22.9 degrees, or about 7 degrees warmer than the long-term average low in November of 16 degrees. The coldest day of the month was on November 25th, with a morning low temp of 5 degrees.

There were four other years when average low temperatures were as warm or warmer than this past November: 2017 (22.9 F), 2008 (23.8 F), and 1998 (24.8 F), 1926 (25.5 F).

That temp in 1926 qualified as the warmest average low temperature in the month of November. The coldest average low in November was in 1952, with an average low of 4 degrees for the month.

3) November 2025’s mean temperature was 35.6 F, which is about 8 degrees warmer than the long-term average, and qualifying as the warmest November mean temperature on record for the Town of Jackson. That broke the old record by a few tenths of a degree, from November 1953’s mean temp of 35.3 degrees. November 1949 is now in third place, with a monthly mean temperature in November of 35.2 degrees.

No other November with complete temperature records had as warm a combination of average high and low temperatures. What is even more amazing about breaking this warm temperature record is, just three years earlier in 2022 the coldest November mean temperature in Jackson was recorded. The mean temperature that November was 17.0 F, breaking the old record of 18.8 degrees from 1938, by nearly two degrees.

Low Snowfall & Precipitation

The Jackson Climate Station recorded 4 inches of snowfall for the month of November 2025. The historic average snowfall in November in town is 9 inches.

Four inches of snow in November might seem low because last November, in 2024, Jackson received almost 11 inches of snow. But the year before that, in November 2023, we only got 4.2 inches. And the year before that, in November 2022, we got 20.6 inches. But the year prior to that, in 2021, Jackson only had 1.3 inches of snowfall in November.

That is how up-and-down November snowfall can be from year to year. Looking back at the entire snowfall record for Jackson in November, for years with complete data, there were 14 other years with less snowfall in November than this one, going back to 1917. Two of those Novembers had absolutely no snow recorded in town in November: 1953, and 1939.

On the flip side, some of you may remember the snowiest November ever, that was in 1985 when 40 inches of snow fell in town that month.

Water content-wise, after well above average precipitation in October 2025, November 2025 ended up with a measly total of only 0.28 inches of precipitation in the Town of Jackson. The average precipitation in November is 1.30 inches.

This was not the driest November on record, but it was the driest we’ve seen here since 1976, when Jackson received only 0.10 inches that November. There were eight other years dating back to 1917 that were drier than this November: 1974, 1969, 1949, 1943, 1939, 1936, 1923, and 1917.

The driest November on record was in 1939, with no precipitation that entire month.

The wettest November on record was in 1988, with 4.24 inches of precipitation.

Post by meteorologist Jim Woodmencey

Fall is upon us, with cooler temperatures and a little snow showing up in the mountains in early October. This is the time of year when our mindset begins making the transition from hiking, biking, boating, and fishing to thoughts of skiing, snowboarding, snow-machining, or heading south to a warmer climate.

Given the change in seasons, this would be a good time to take a gander at this winter’s weather outlook, to see what we might expect for precipitation and temperatures in the coming months.

NOAA’s Outlook

The long-range outlook from NOAA’s Climate Prediction Center for the northern half of Wyoming and for all of Montana during the main winter months, December 2025 through February 2026, shows precipitation is expected to be in the above normal category for that three-month period. (Maps from NOAA’s Seasonal Outlook page).

Looking at the next three-month outlook period, January 2026 through March 2026, the forecast is even more solidly in the above normal precipitation category for Wyoming, including Jackson Hole and eastern Idaho. That bodes well for us as far as our chances of a good snowfall winter.

Temperatures this winter for most of the northern and central Rockies, including Montana, Wyoming northern Utah and central Colorado shows no trend either way, warmer or colder. Temps are in the “Equal Chance” category. The Equal Chances category means that the odds are the same for having above normal, below normal, or normal temperatures this winter.

Click here for: How to Read the 3-Class Three Month Outlooks

Below is the forecast map for December-January-February. The map for January-February-March looks very similar.

For comparison, last year at around this same time, NOAA’s forecast was for “Equal Chances” for both precipitation and temperatures. Temperatures ended up above normal in December, February, and March in the Town of Jackson. While snowfall ended up above normal for those three months – and also for the whole winter – both in town and up in the mountains. January was the only month last winter with below normal temperatures and below normal snowfall.

ENSO Forecast

ENSO is acronym for the El Nino Southern Oscillation, which describes the state of sea-surface temperatures in the equatorial Pacific Ocean. El Nino is one phase of ENSO. Simply put, an El Nino is when sea surface temperatures in the Equatorial Pacific are warmer than normal. A La Nina is when those temperatures are colder than normal. Both El Nino and La Nina have some effect on the weather patterns that develop across the Pacific Ocean, primarily during the Northern Hemisphere’s winter season.

The common thinking is that an El Nino winter favors a more southern storm track across the Pacific, bringing above normal precipitation to California and the Sierras, as well as the Southwestern United States. La Nina winters favor more precipitation and snow over the northern tier of the United States, including Western Wyoming.

The latest ENSO forecast from October 9th, 2025 said: “La Niña conditions are present and favored to persist through December 2025 – February 2026, with a transition to ENSO-neutral likely in January-March 2026 (55% chance).

Be careful how much faith you put into ENSO forecasts. A recent study done in California showed that El Nino’s only produced above normal snowfall about 35-percent of the time. Therefore, the hype about El Nino that we have heard for the last 30 years may be a bit overdone. Same with La Nina’s in the northern tier, some La Nina years were very beneficial snowfall-wise, others were not.

Farmer’s Almanac

Now let’s review what the Farmers Almanacs have to say. There are two of them to look at, the Old Farmer’s Almanac and the Farmers’ Almanac.

The Old Farmer’s Almanac prediction, which has been around since 1792, calls for “Mild and Wet” conditions this winter for Wyoming, Idaho, Utah, and Colorado. And, “Mild and Dry” conditions for western Washington and Oregon, and all of California. Saying, “wet”, in the winter forecast would translate to more precipitation than normal, and thus more snow for the mountains, I’ll assume. Saying, “mild”, I suppose means temperatures will be near or just above normal.

The Farmers’ Almanac, which began its weather prognostications in 1818, has the most succinct forecast for the Rockies. They are calling for, “Very Cold and Snowy” conditions this winter for all of Montana, Wyoming, and Colorado.

Bingo! That does it. It’s confirmed. All forecasts for this winter are leaning towards more precipitation, which must mean we’ll have more snow that average here in Jackson Hole, right?

Final Words

One last thing to consider, from a statistical perspective: In the last seven years there has only been one winter, the winter of 2021-22, that registered below average snowfall at the Jackson Hole Mountain Resort. Within the last seven years at JHMR, 5 of those winters ranked in the top-ten snowiest winters on record. Just three winters ago, in 2022-23, JHMR had their second snowiest winter ever. The question is, will this snowier than normal trend continue? Or, statistically speaking, are we due for a below average snowfall winter? The forecasts all say, “no”. Maybe it will be the next winter when the snowfall is leaner than normal.

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Post by Jim Woodmencey. Some of this text originally appeared in the Jackson Hole News and Guide, Mountain Weather column, on October 8th, 2025.

Jim is the chief meteorologist at mountainweather.com and has been forecasting the weather in Jackson Hole and the Teton Range for almost 35 years.