🇦🇫Afghanistan

Afghanistan lies between 29°N and 38°N in landlocked Central and South Asia, dominated by the towering Hindu Kush range. The country shows predominantly arid and semi-arid climates — Köppen BSh in the lowlands, BSk and BWk across much of the interior — with a strongly continental character: scorching summers, frigid winters, and large diurnal swings.

Kabul, at 1,800 m elevation, averages around −2°C in January and 25°C in July, while Kandahar in the southern plains often exceeds 32°C at midsummer; Jalalabad, lower and warmer, feels almost subtropical year-round. Precipitation is heavily orographic: the Hindu Kush intercepts moisture and delivers more than 1,000 mm a year on its highest slopes, whereas the southwestern deserts — Sistan, Registan, and the Helmand Basin — receive less than 100 mm. The notorious 120-day Sistan wind (Bad-e-Sad-o-Bist) scours the southwest from late spring through summer, and the fringes of the Indian monsoon occasionally bring heavier rains to Nuristan and the southeastern valleys in July and August.

Our archive covers 10 Afghan cities with daily ERA5 reanalysis data going back to 1940. The warmest July averages occur in Kandahār, around 40.5°C, while Ghazni records the coldest January nights near −12.7°C. Comparing the last decade against the 1940–1970 baseline, mean temperatures across these cities have risen by about 2.1°C.