We haven’t even reached the first day of winter yet (Sunday, December 21st, 9:03am), but we’ve already gotten more snow in Rockford and the Rockford area than we got all of last winter. The winter of 2025 may end up being a record-setter when it comes to snowfall, but it’s too early to tell. The same goes for records for cold weather.
As some super cold air settles across Northern Illinois this weekend, you should be bracing yourself for a frigid couple of nights. Forecasters are predicting temperatures dipping as low as –7 degrees Saturday night and –5 degrees Sunday night. There’s no argument that temps like that are uncomfortable, but just how does that stack up against the deep‑freeze history of Rockford? Let’s break out the record books and find out.
Let’s Get This Out Of The Way First: This Weekend’s Temps Won’t Even Be Close To Rockford’s All-Time Low Temperature Record
According to the National Weather Service (NWS), the coldest temperature ever recorded in Rockford happened on January 31, 2019, when the mercury plunged all the way down to –31 degrees. Before that, some of the other Rockford “deep freeze” days saw temps drop to -27 degrees and lower during January winters.
So compared to that extreme, this weekend’s forecast is nowhere near breaking Rockford’s all‑time coldest mark…