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Relative humidity (RH) has an important effect on precipitation, especially in arid and semiarid regions. Prediction of RH has been the focus of attention of climate change researchers as well. In this investigation, the accuracy of six intelligent models, including an artificial neural network (ANN), a co-active neuro-fuzzy inference system (CANFIS), principal component analysis (PCA) combined with ANN (PCA–ANN) and three hybrid wavelet-artificial intelligence models, including WANN, WCANFIS and WPCA–ANN, was evaluated in daily RH prediction. Thirty weather stations located in different climates in Iran for the period 2000–2010 were selected for the evaluation and comparison of these models. The performance of each model was evaluated using correlation coefficient (r) and normal root mean square error (NRMSE). Based on the statistical evaluation criteria, the accuracy ranks of the six models were: WPCA–ANN, WCANFIS, WANN, PCA–ANN, ANN and CANFIS. The results indicated that the WPCA–ANN model was the optimal model for estimation of RH, and the range of NRMSE and r values were from 0.009 to 0.080 and from 0.996 to 0.999, respectively. Overall, WPCA–ANN is a new approach that can be successfully applied to predict RH with a high accuracy. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]