Abstract
The stratospheric quasi-biennial oscillation (QBO) is a key modulator of interannual variability in global weather and climate. Over recent decades, the amplitude of the lower-stratospheric QBO has weakened, and in recent years the QBO has experienced unprecedented disruptions. However, the longer-term evolution of the QBO and its impact on tropospheric circulation remain uncertain. Here, based on CMIP6 models with extended projections beyond 2100 and targeted sensitivity experiments, we show that under ongoing global warming, the QBO exhibits a progressively weaker amplitude and shorter period, eventually risking complete disappearance. This is projected to reduce the predictability of 2–3-year climate forecasts in the troposphere. The weakening of the QBO amplitude arises from enhanced tropical upwelling, whereas the shortening of its period results from the combined influence of strengthened upwelling and intensified wave activity. The potential disappearance of the QBO poses new challenges for climate change under high emission.
Data availability
The ERA5 reanalysis56 data used in this study are available in the Copernicus Climate Change Service (C3S) Climate Data Store57 (https://doi.org/10.24381/cds.6860a573). The CMIP6 model data42 used in this study are available in the Earth System Grid Federation (ESGF) database (https://esgf-metagrid.cloud.dkrz.de/search/cmip6-dkrz/). The HadISST data58 used in this study are available from the UK Met Office Hadley Center (http://www.metoffice.gov.uk/hadobs/hadisst/data/download.html). The sensitivity experiment outputs and the source data underlying each figure that support the findings of this Article are available in the Zenodo repository59.
Code availability
The code used for data analysis and figure generation in this study is available in the Zenodo repository59. The source codes for CESM1 and CESM2 are freely available from the CESM website: https://www.cesm.ucar.edu/models/releases.
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Acknowledgements
We thank the ERA5, NASA and UK Met Office Hadley Center for providing the observational data. We thank the NCAR for providing the WACCM model, and the CMIP6 project. Funding for this research was provided by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (Grants 42394120, W.S.T. and 42375070, F.X.) and the Fundamental Research Funds for the Central Universities (F.X.).
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F.X. and W.S.T. contributed to the original idea. F.H.L. and F.X. wrote this paper drafted the figures and undertook the numerical simulations. T.J.Z., Y.L.N., Y.X., J.L.L., R.H.Z., Y.W., W.J.L. interpreted the results and discussed their implications.
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Luo, F., Xie, F., Zhou, T. et al. The disappearing quasi-biennial oscillation under sustained global warming. Nat Commun (2026). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41467-026-68922-2
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/s41467-026-68922-2
