What year had the lowest amount of tornadoes ever recorded?

Answer 1

That is difficult to answer, as prior to the 1990s, we did not accurately record the number of tornadoes, and the only consistent source that goes back before 1950 only lists significant tornadoes. However, by the 1980s were were recording cloase to the same percentage of tornadoes that we do today. Based on these 34 years of data, the year with the fewest recorded tornadoes is 1987, with 656 recorded tornadoes in the United States. Other data also suggests that this was a rather inactive year.