Marco Bella, Vivian Poulin, Sunny Vagnozzi, Lloyd Knox

We show that the strong constraints placed by Planck NPIPE Cosmic Microwave Background (CMB) data on axion-like early dark energy (EDE) are significantly alleviated in models with multiple fields. We find a $1.5σ$ residual tension with the Local Distance Network value of $H_0$ in a 2-field model, with no improvement beyond two fields, and a best-fit value of $H_0$ $\sim 1.4σ$ larger than in the 1-field case. The second field improves the fit to high-$\ell$ CMB data, where 1-field EDE is most strongly disfavored, and suggests modifications to the pre-recombination history over a wider redshift range.