The forecasts for 2019 may be more reliable than usual, according to reports.

Although white Christmases have become a rarer phenomenon in Norway, with this year no exception, some parts of the country will wake up to bleak midwinter weather at Christmas.

A number of signs can be used to predict the yuletide weather, Aftenposten reports.

If there is already snow on the ground where you live, it is likely that will also be the case once Santa has passed by with his sleigh. The opposite also holds true: if you don’t have snow on the ground right now, you’re less likely to have a white Christmas.

A spell of milder temperatures is forecast to begin around Thursday and continue through the weekend before becoming colder, Magnus Ovhed, duty meteorologist at the Norwegian Meteorological Institute, told Aftenposten.

“The whole country will have a period of milder weather. But there is consensus that it will get colder after this spell of mild weather,” Ovhed said.

That means temperatures around Christmas Eve are likely to be similar to now.

Norway residents can check out the depth of snow in their local area on this website, which the Norwegian Meteorological Institute helped to develop.

The Meteorological Institute tweeted three images comparing the forecast snowfall for Christmas 2019 with the actual snowfall for the last two Christmases.

The images show more Christmas snow in both 2017 and 2018 compared to this year's forecast.

There will still be snow in much of the country, however.

“First and foremost, there is snow inland, and then there is snow along large sections of the coast all the way up to Lofoten,” Ovhed told Aftenposten.

Oslo, can expect sub-zero temperatures on Christmas Eve but snow is unlikely, the meteorologist said.

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