The new year is set to kick off with widespread snow as the latest weather maps forecast sweeping showers hitting 23 counties across England alone. New models from weather forecaster WX Charts show plummeting temperatures and downpours of snow hitting England as soon as Friday, January 2, as an Arctic blast takes hold of the nation’s weather for the coming weeks.

Weather data suggests that bands of snow will push south across England during the early hours of Friday. Showers will begin to fall at around 3am in the North West of England, moving down over the Irish Sea before hitting the likes of Cumbria, Lancashire, Merseyside and parts of Yorkshire before heading south. These showers are more likely to be flurries, but as the night continues, heavy snowfall will start to fall over central England.

At 6am, the snow will begin to blanket much of the Midlands, with Birmingham, Manchester and Stoke-on-Trent all being affected.

As the day continues, the belt will continue to travel with the south-easterly wind and by 9am, the Midlands and the North West will still see showers, but the white stuff will also be falling in a new belt across London, Hertfordshire, Essex and Suffolk.

Into the evening, much of the snowfall will have started to clear, but temperatures will remain frosty with most of the nation seeing the mercury drop into the negatives by 6pm.

While WXCharts maps are based on individual model runs and can change as new data arrives, similar cold signals have appeared repeatedly in recent forecasts.

The Met Office has said widespread frost and icy conditions are expected in early January, with snow possible at times, especially during northerly or north-easterly flows.

During this time, the agency also has a yellow weather warning for snow and ice in Northern Scotland with temperatures there expected to plummet to -7C, which could be extended to England should the forecasts continue.

In their forecast, the Met Office writes: “Cold northerly winds dominate across the UK in the first week of January. These will bring wintry showers (often of snow) to many coastlines (and areas just inland of these) that are exposed to onshore winds.”