Was August 2026 hotter than normal in Texas?
Austin ran 13.6% above normal in August 2026 and San Antonio 4.8% above normal, measured against NOAA's 1991-2020 normals.
The short answer
Austin ran 13.6% above normal in August 2026. San Antonio ran 4.8% above normal.
Those are measured against a fixed 1991-2020 yardstick, not against last year and not against how it felt.
Austin
August 2026: 755 cooling degree-days, against a normal of 664.8 cooling degree-days — 13.6% above normal (NOAA NCEI Global Summary of the Month and NOAA NCEI U.S. Climate Normals 1991-2020, as of August 2026).
The month before, July 2026, came in at 644 cooling degree-days against a normal of 644.8 cooling degree-days — 0.1% below normal. Two consecutive months, two different answers, which is the usual shape of a Texas summer and the reason a single “it was brutal” rarely survives contact with the record.
San Antonio
August 2026: 700 cooling degree-days against a normal of 667.9 cooling degree-days — 4.8% above normal.
July 2026: 607 cooling degree-days against 643.3 cooling degree-days — 5.6% below normal.
Why “normal” is doing real work here
A normal is not last year, and it is not an average of whatever we happen to hold. It is the 1991-2020 reference period NOAA publishes for each station and month — a fixed yardstick that does not move when a hot year lands. That is what makes “hotter than normal” a claim rather than an impression.
Cooling degree-days are the measure underneath it: a count of how far each day sat above the comfort baseline, added up across the month. More degree-days means the weather demanded more cooling, which is the closest thing to an objective answer to “was it worse this time”.
What this does not tell you
We cannot say from a degree-day total how the month actually felt — the measure counts cooling demand, and nothing in it captures humidity, overnight lows, or how long the heat ran without a break.
What it does tell you is whether the demand for cooling was unusual — and in August 2026, in Austin, it ran above the long-run mark by a margin you can check yourself.