🇳🇦Namibia

Namibia spans 17°00′–28°58′S as a southern African country (approximately 825,615 km²) on the southwestern Atlantic coast bordering Angola, Zambia, Botswana, and South Africa, with a 1,572 km coastline along the cold Benguela Current. One of the world's most arid countries, the landscape is dominated by the world's oldest desert — the 80-million-year-old Namib Desert with the towering Sossusvlei dunes — the central Khomas Highland featuring Brandberg at 2,573 m and Königstein at 2,606 m (the country's highest peak), the eastern Kalahari sand-veld, and the lush Caprivi (Zambezi) Strip in the far northeast on the Zambezi and Cuando rivers.

This exceptional topography produces an extraordinary climate spectrum — cool-coast desert (BWh-BWk) on the Namib coast at Lüderitz and Walvis Bay where the cold Benguela produces persistent fog and remarkably temperate temperatures despite the latitude, hot desert (BWh) in the inland Namib, hot semi-arid (BSh) on the central plateau around Windhoek, and tropical savanna (Aw) in the Caprivi.

Windhoek at 1,728 m elevation averages 14°C in July and 24°C in January with 360 mm rainfall almost entirely concentrated December–March. Walvis Bay on the cold Atlantic registers 15°C in July and 19°C in January with only 17 mm — an extraordinary example of cool-coast aridity. Lüderitz on the Atlantic averages 13°C in July and 16°C in January with 18 mm — among Africa's coolest places.

Keetmanshoop records 11°C in July and 30°C in January with 150 mm. Tsumeb averages 13°C in July and 24°C in January with 540 mm. Katima Mulilo in the Caprivi registers 14°C in July and 26°C in January with 700 mm. The Königstein summit experiences −5°C with rare snow.

Major events include the severe 2018–19 multi-year drought that the government declared a national emergency, the severe 2013 ENSO drought, the severe 2008–09 Caprivi Strip floods, recurrent severe summer thunderstorm-driven flash floods at Windhoek, intensifying Benguela upwelling shifts threatening the Namibian fishery, accelerating Namib coastal fog decline (the desert's ecological lifeline), and growing groundwater stress in the Cuvelai-Etosha basin.

Our archive covers 1 Namibian cities with daily ERA5 reanalysis data going back to 1940. The warmest July averages occur in Windhoek, around 20.9°C, while Windhoek records the coldest January nights near 17.1°C. Comparing the last decade against the 1940–1970 baseline, mean temperatures across these cities have risen by about 1.8°C.