January global surface TempLS down 0.033°C from December.

The TempLS mesh anomaly (1961-90 base) was 0.704deg;C in January vs 0.737°C in December. That makes it the fourth warmest January in the record.

Land temperatures were down, but SST rose a little after two months of decline. Despite the late cold snap in the mid-west, the US was not particularly cold, although the Hudson's Bay region of Canada was. The Sahara was cool too, but there were big warm patches in Siberia, the Caspian region, Alaska, and, notably, Australia.
Here is the temperature map. As always, there is a more detailed active sphere map here.

This post is part of a series that has now run since 2011. The TempLS mesh data is reported here, and the recent history of monthly readings is here. Unadjusted GHCN is normally used, but if you click the TempLS button there, it will show data with adjusted, and also with different integration methods. There is an interactive graph using 1981-2010 base period here which you can use to show different periods, or compare with other indices. There is a general guide to TempLS here.

The reporting cycle starts with a report of the daily reanalysis index on about the 4th of the month. The next post is this, the TempLS report, usually about the 8th. Then when the GISS result comes out, usually about the 15th, I discuss it and compare with TempLS. The TempLS graph uses a spherical harmonics to the TempLS mesh residuals; the residuals are displayed more directly using a triangular grid in a better resolved WebGL plot here.

A list of earlier monthly reports of each series in date order is here:

1. NCEP/NCAR Reanalysis report
2. TempLS report
3. GISS report and comparison with TempLS