Met Office forecasts thunderstorms on Tuesday as BBC names areas facing heavy rain

Thunderstorms are expected to sweep across the UK next week, with some regions facing up to 4cm of rain.

Although Monday will be “fine and dry” with temperatures expected to reach 25C, the Met Office says weather conditions will turn “more unsettled” from Tuesday with rain and thunderstorms moving northwards.

The BBC Weather outlook is similar, and states “heavy rain and downpours moving in from the south” could turn “thundery” on Tuesday, while “this risk persists into Wednesday” - particularly in England and Wales later in the day.

BBC forecasters say that while the full extent of the storms remains “uncertain”, rain could reach the south coast overnight into Tuesday, with “more substantial rain” expected midweek.

“Western areas will see the most” rain, according to the BBC, as upland areas could receive 3cm to 4cm by the end of the week, “with eastern Britain receiving about half of that”.

In a long-range forecast on the Met Office’s YouTube channel, meteorologist Annie Shuttleworth explains that an area of low pressure around the Bay of Biscay will push towards the UK from the south at the start of next week, bringing rain across Tuesday and Wednesday.

She said: “There’s some uncertainty in the timings for the arrival of this low pressure, but it’s likely to be quite a wet day through Tuesday and also Wednesday, particularly across southern and western areas of the UK - but some of that rainfall could push further north.

“We’ll also see a risk of thunderstorms with this rainfall as well, so again we could see quite a lot of rain falling in a short period of time.

"There could be some impacts from this rainfall, if we do see localised surface water flooding.”

However, the low pressure system is also expected to “pick up some warmer air”, so temperatures are expected to rise following a cooler weekend.

The Met Office’s latest predictions have temperatures reaching 25C on Monday and Tuesday before rising to 27C on Wednesday.