Norwegian meteorologists Vilhelm Bjerknes proposed the above concept in 1904.  Later, British meteorologists Lewis Fry Richardson formulated the detailed procedures and tried to solve the problem numerically.  As general-purpose computers had not yet been invented at that time and the computation was highly complicated, Richardson spent almost six weeks to complete a weather forecast for six hours.  However, he predicted an air pressure change of 145 hPa in six hours, which was exceptionally erroneous.  As a result, when he published his method and findings in 1922, his work was not well recognised.  Meteorologist Jule Charney and mathematician John Von Neumann later simplified the mathematical model and ran it on the first general-purpose computer the Electronic Numerical Integrator And Computer (ENIAC).  The first computer-generated numerical weather forecast was eventually produced in 1950. In the early days of operational NWP, forecasters were skeptical about numerical models.  But nowadays NWP has become an indispensable companion of forecasters, as its skill has significantly improved due to the increase in computing power, better representation of atmospheric process by NWP models and enhancement in both quantity and quality of weather observations.

Sometimes, systematic biases are observed in direct outputs of numerical models.  In addition, model forecasts are the same for locations within the same grid cell.  If the local terrain and land surface characteristics vary considerably among these grid point locations, large errors in surface temperature and winds could result.  To reduce these errors, model outputs are usually post-processed to add more values to the model outputs.