2024 will go down in history as the second-worst tornado season on record. 1,735 tornadoes have been confirmed so far in the United States, with the potential for a few more to be added from the late December outbreak.
One of our clients, AccuWeather, breaks down the historical tornado season. In total, 53 people were killed by tornadoes in 2024. 2024 also had the most EF2 or stronger tornadoes since 2011, a year marked by many strong, deadly tornadoes.
Texas has the country’s largest tornado count in 2024 with 169 confirmed. Although Texas is a large state and often is number one due to its location in Tornado Alley, Hurricane Beryl helped secure the top spot in 2024.
Nebraska and Iowa tied for the second most tornadoes with 131, with Illinois following with 126 confirmed tornadoes. Florida ranked just outside the top 5 due to an unusually high amount of tornadoes for the year because of Hurricane Milton, which spawned more than twice the daily record of tornadoes.
Although reports are still preliminary, Ohio and New York likely broke yearly tornado records with 82 and 32 tornadoes respectively. Oklahoma and Illinois have already declared that a record tornado year was set in those states.
Only three states did not record any tornadoes in 2024: Nevada, Vermont, and Maine.
Hurricanes Beryl, Debby, Helene, and Milton caused a combined 178 tornadoes. Only two years since 1995 have delivered more hurricane-spawned tornadoes: 2004 with 317 and 2005 with 237.
Not surprisingly, the National Weather Service issued the highest number of tornado warnings since 2011, with 3,936 warnings. Florida, Oklahoma, Ohio, and New York had more tornado warnings issued than any other year on record.
