Viewing extreme precipitation intensification through an absolute-change lens

While relative fractional changes are widely used to characterize extreme precipitation intensification under climate warming, absolute changes provide a complementary perspective that more directly quantifies the magnitude of extreme precipitation intensification, with direct implications for assessing potential impacts. By analyzing annual maximum daily precipitation in climate models, we show that the geographical patterns of the strongest extreme precipitation intensification identified from absolute changes differ from those highlighted by relative changes, and that the most intense annual maxima exhibit substantially larger absolute increases than weaker annual maxima despite only modest differences in their relative changes. Although thermodynamic moistening produces broadly similar relative increases in stronger and weaker annual maxima, it leads to substantially larger absolute increases in stronger maxima, primarily owing to differences in climatological intensity. Dynamic contributions reinforce this intensity-dependent contrast in some regions, particularly in the South and East Asian monsoon regions and equatorial Africa. These contrasts highlight the value of considering absolute changes alongside relative changes to better characterize the magnitude and geographical patterns of extreme precipitation intensification and inform assessments of potential impacts under climate warming.