California weather by month
Twelve stations from Death Valley to the Sierra — California holds most of the country’s climates inside one border, and no state needs its regions kept apart more than this one.
Based on 12 weather stations.
The year across California
| Month | Highs | Nights | Wet days |
|---|---|---|---|
| January | 43–71° | 18–50° | 1–9 |
| February | 43–74° | 19–52° | 1–9 |
| March | 48–83° | 24–57° | 1–10 |
| April | 53–91° | 28–65° | 0–8 |
| May | 62–101° | 33–75° | 0–4 |
| June | 67–111° | 38–84° | 0–1 |
| July | 66–117° | 43–91° | 0–1 |
| August | 68–116° | 41–89° | 0–1 |
| September | 70–108° | 35–79° | 0–1 |
| October | 62–93° | 29–65° | 0–5 |
| November | 51–79° | 23–55° | 0–8 |
| December | 43–69° | 18–50° | 1–11 |
A single row can hide a real spread — open a month to see it region by region.
Southern California
- Los Angeles A city with one long dry stretch and a short, generous rainy season, where the coast and the valleys can feel like different states on the same afternoon.
- Anaheim Inland Orange County sits just far enough from the water to lose the sea breeze — brighter winters, hotter late summers, and rain packed into a few winter weeks.
- San Diego The mildest year in America, with a gray-morning habit in early summer and a short, tidy rainy season in winter.
- Santa Barbara A south-facing coast with a gentle year, its rain crowded into winter and its early-summer mornings handed over to the marine layer.
Central Coast
- Monterey A peninsula with almost no seasons at all — the thermometer barely moves across the year, and the fog decides everything else.
- Santa Cruz A surf town with a mild, foggy summer, a genuinely wet winter, and the best weeks saved for after Labor Day.
Bay Area & Wine Country
- San Francisco A city that runs its summer in the fall, wraps its July in fog, and squeezes nearly all its rain into a handful of winter months.
- Napa A valley that spends half the year bone dry and golden and the other half green and soaked, with fog creeping up from the bay most mornings.
The Deserts
- Palm Springs A desert town with two personalities: a long, glorious cool season that everyone comes for, and a summer that empties the streets by mid-morning.
- Death Valley The lowest, driest, hottest place in North America — glorious for half the year and genuinely hazardous for the other half.
The Sierra
- Yosemite Valley A mountain park with a soaking, snowbound winter and a bone-dry summer, where the waterfalls run on a schedule the snowpack sets.
- South Lake Tahoe A high mountain basin with brilliant dry summers, hard winters that arrive with chain controls, and nights that stay cold in every month of the year.