Meteorologists around the world are warning of an expected “super El Niño” later this year.

For Australia that could mean a rapid shift from flooding rain to  extreme heat, drought and an increased chance of bushfires,

Based on predictions from various global organisations, this year’s looming weather pattern could become one of the strongest on record – hence the super El Niño tag, which some have gone as far as upgrading to a mythical “Godzilla El Niño”.

But what is a so-called super El Niño, what does it mean for a Australia in 2026 and should we be concerned?

What is an El Niño

The El Niño  is a natural and reoccurring climate pattern in the Pacific Ocean that influences the probability of varying weather patterns affecting Australia.

Climatologists generally describe an El Niño as the weather pattern that occurs when we experience higher-than-average sea surface temperatures in the central tropical Pacific, and the trade winds blowing east to west across the equator weaken. 

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These patters occur semi-regularly, on average every four to five years. The last in Australia was during 2023.

During an El Niño, we tend to have warmer than usual temperatures and lower winter-spring rainfall in eastern Australia.

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During the ‘strong’ 1997–98 El Niño (a), rainfall didn’t change much. But during the ‘weak’ 2002–03 El Niño (b), major rainfall defects emerged. Source: BoM/Climate Extremes

Predicting an El Niño – and its opposite, a La Niña – matters because they have the biggest influence on rainfall and temperature differences in eastern Australia.

Drought is a key concern for countries like Australia and some of the most severe droughts in past decades occurred during an El Niño.

What is a super El Niño?

Some El Niño patterns can be stronger or weaker than others.

The strength of an El Niño is monitored using the Nino 3.4 index, a measure of how much warmer (or cooler) than usual the ocean is in a region in the East Pacific.

When ocean temperatures are 0.8 degrees warmer than usual in that region, and the trade winds have sufficiently weakened, the Bureau of Meteorology can declare an El Niño has arrived.

A “super El Niño” is when the region’s ocean temperatures rise 2 degrees – or roughly two standard deviations – above normal. While scientists first coined the “super” term, the evocative phrase has also become a favourite of media commentators.

Kimberly Reid, a climate scientist as Monash University, said Australian forecasters didn’t, however, generally describe their weather forecasts in terms of being super.

“When we measure the strength of the El Niño, we are really only referring to ocean temperatures in the eastern Pacific,” Reid wrote this week in The Conversation.

“But this figure is not very well correlated with less rain in eastern Australia. It also only captures ocean changes and doesn’t reflect the El Niño atmospheric changes which influence the weather systems that actually bring rain to Australia,” she said.

Should Australians be worried?

The strength of an El Niño isn’t always what determines the extent of its affect on Australia’s weather.

Relatively weak El Niño events can produce widespread severe droughts – as happened in 2006 – while strong events, like the 2015 super El Niño, can bring just a short-lived drought.

Despite the variability, the stronger the El Niño, the more likely our weather is affected.

“As a scientist who has researched seasonal forecasts of Australian rainfall, my advice is to ignore autumn headlines warning of a potentially catastrophic ‘super El Niño’,” Reid said.

“It’s worth waiting until the end of autumn or early winter before taking El Niño forecasts too seriously.”

Reid said the current “gold standard “for Australian seasonal forecasts was the Bureau of Meteorology’s long-range forecasts.

“But even here, these forecasts become quite uncertain more than a month in the future. It’s important to regularly check for updated forecasts,” she said.

“Will we get an El Niño this year? The only scientifically accurate answer as of April 2026 is ‘maybe’. It’s way too early to say anything other than that an El Niño is more likely to form this year than a La Niña.”