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Sydney will experience a comfortable 29 degree day but temperatures across western Sydney and on the city's fringe are likely to top 35 degrees.
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Canberra is forecast to hit a Saturday high of 38 degrees while the mercury will rise to 35 degrees in Batemans Bay, 41 degrees in Griffith and 41 degrees in Gundagai.
The Bureau of Meteorology expects the fire danger to continue escalating into next week, with increasing heat and dry winds.
Temperatures are expected to peak on Tuesday, with New Year's Eve forecasts of more than 40 degrees across western Sydney and in regional NSW.
The rising temperatures come after firefighters spent the past five days striving to contain large and complex bushfires before conditions worsen.
After a devastating end to last week, with two firefighters killed and as many as 1000 NSW houses destroyed, firefighters have taken advantage of milder conditions to strengthen containment lines.
Almost 1300 were in the field on Friday as 70 bush and grass fires continued to burn, with more than 30 yet to be contained.
Bronte Beach on Saturday.Credit:Steven Siewert
RFS Commissioner Shane Fitzsimmons said firefighters had completed challenging work in areas such as the Blue Mountains and south coast, backburning and establishing containment lines with hand tools and machinery.
Mr Fitzsimmons said the RFS was not expecting the earlier catastrophic conditions to return, but firefighters and communities would be challenged.
Blue Mountains City Council mayor Mark Greenhill said this year's extended bushfire season meant locals were living with immense stress.
The area continues to be affected by the Ruined Castle and Grose Valley fires, which spread from the Gospers Mountain mega-blaze to the north.
Locals at Bronte Beach.Credit:Steven Siewert
The Green Wattle Creek fire to the south may also pose a threat in the future, Mr Greenhill said, adding the community was "far from out of the woods".
"For the whole community this is a very stressful, long endurance episode for them; it just goes on and on," he said on Friday.
NSW Emergency Services Minister David Elliott, meanwhile, has gone on a family holiday overseas but says he'll continue to receive bi-daily RFS updates.
His frontbench colleague Anthony Roberts has stepped into the role from Friday.
AAP