July 2016 marked the hottest month recorded since scientists started recording climates in 1880, according to NASA. The temperature across Earth's oceans and land last month was 0.84 degrees Celsius (1.51 degrees Fahrenheit) warmer than the average, The Atlantic reported.
July is usually the hottest month of the year, and 2016 has been exceptionally warm. According to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration's data, every month since May 2015 has broken its previous temperature record.
The first seven months of 2016 are the hottest January to July ever recorded, surpassing the previous record set in 2010, The Atlantic reported. There is a 99 percent chance that 2016 will beat an annual heat record, according to Gavin Schmidt, PhD, a climatologist with NASA.
Record high temperatures will likely begin to decline in the later months this year, as heat records thus far have been fueled by the El Niño weather pattern, according to the report.