•The upper homeostatic temperature range of irrigated US wheat is between 25°C and 30°C.•Absolute temperature exposure models overestimate the upper homeostatic range.•Relative temperature exposure models integrate temperature effects on growth and development.•Crop yield survey data obscure the temperature response due to their low interannual variability. High temperature (HT) and drought (D) have detrimental effects on growth and phenology that result in reductions of the yields of agricultural crops. Nevertheless, homeostatic ranges of tolerance exist. Recent analysis of survey data and simulations suggest US wheat (Triticum aestivum L.) yields remain relatively stable under irrigation in the range of 35°– 40°C. Applying analogue statistical procedures on experimental data and simulations from the Hot Serial Cereal Experiment (HSC) we demonstrate that failed incorporation of the corresponding phenological acceleration due to HT and a low interannual temperature variability lead to this result. Here, we incorporate the phenological effect into the used binned temperature exposure yield model by rescaling (normalizing) the absolute seasonal temperature counts to a maximum season length. The application to observed and simulated HSC data with a wide temperature range reveals that the suggested upper homeostatic response limit of US wheat yields to HT requires a down–revision. HT stress can be reduced by transpirational cooling. However, the effect is currently not sufficient to expand the homeostatic range of irrigated wheat markedly beyond 25°C taking our analysis of the HSC experiment.