The Met Office data analysed by the BBC suggests there have been fewer widespread white Christmases in past two decades.

While we cannot use what happens on one day of the year to assess whether the decline is due explicitly to climate change, scientists suggest a white Christmas will become less likely in the future.

According to the Met Office, the UK has already warmed by 1C since about the 1950s and we have seen less frost and snow as a result.

In the 1990s and early-2000s there were five years with a widespread white Christmas where more than 100 weather stations reporting falling snow.

But in the past 20 years the most stations reporting a white Christmas was 30 in 2010.

So far in the 2020s there have already been four white Christmases declared with snowfall reported somewhere in the UK but falling snow was only confirmed by at most six stations in a year.

While better technology means recording snowfall at just one location in the UK has increased the likelihood of having a confirmed white Christmas, the number of stations actually seeing snow on Christmas Day appears to have declined.

Our winters are expected to get warmer and wetter and a Met Office spokesperson confirmed snowy spells were “becoming less frequent as our climate warms”.

They added “natural variability means cold, snowy periods will still happen”, but we can expect “fewer frost and snow days”.

Additional reporting by Alix Hattenstone.