Tampa weather by month — averages, rainfall & climate trends
Curling around its bay on the Gulf of Mexico, Tampa runs the most dramatic summer storm season in the United States — the Lightning Capital of North America, where sea breezes from two coastlines collide almost every afternoon from June through September. Average temperatures and rainfall by month, a climate graph, today's conditions versus the long-term average, and how the climate has shifted since 1940 — all on one page for Tampa, United States.
Today vs average
+2.5°Cwarmer than usual
How it’s changed
Right now
What it's doing today vs the historical average for this date.
Right now
28.4°
34°25°
35°24°36°26°36°25°36°26°35°28°34°28°On this date — July 21
Warmer than usual · 2.5°C above the average high
- Record high: 34.8° · 2010
- Record low: 22.2° · 1965
- One year ago: 32.7°
Every July 21 in history — coldest to hottest
Dots show daily highs (top) and lows (bottom) for each July 21 on record (n = 87). Outlined dots are today's forecast.
Area we sample
Each city's history comes from one ERA5 grid cell — about 28 km across, shown by the dashed box. Near mountains or coasts, conditions can vary across the cell.
Location & data
Historical weather for Tampa is sampled from the ECMWF ERA5 reanalysis at 27.95°N, 82.46°W, with daily records since 1940.
- Coordinates
- 27.95°N, 82.46°W
- Time zone
- America/New York
- Period
- 1940–2026
- Data source
- ERA5 (ECMWF)
Last 30 days
28 of the last 31 days were warmer than the historical average for that date. Average difference: +1.3°C.
Each bar is one day, from morning low to afternoon high. Warm-colored bars are days whose mean ran above average; cool bars ran below. The dot inside the bar is the daily mean. The shaded band is the typical 10–90% range expected for that date. Average = the day's mean temperature averaged across every year of record (1940–2026) for that calendar date.
This date over the years
One dot per year — the mean temperature on this calendar date. Dots are warmer or cooler than the long-term average (dashed line); the shaded band is the typical 10–90% range, and the highlighted dot is today's forecast. Based on ERA5 reanalysis — modelled estimates, not station readings.
Weather by month
Average temperatures and rainfall for each month — what a typical year looks like, from the full record.Climate overview
Tampa curves around the head of Tampa Bay, a large natural inlet from the Gulf of Mexico, with a humid subtropical climate (Köppen Cfa) that takes on a distinctly tropical feel in summer. The dual coastline — along the bay and near the Gulf — creates ideal conditions for daily sea-breeze collisions that generate an almost clockwork cycle of afternoon thunderstorms between June and September, earning the region its long-standing designation as the Lightning Capital of North America. Winters are dry, mild and generally sunny.
Tampa Bay's long-term hurricane vulnerability is among the highest of any major American city, a consequence of the bay's funnel shape, the shallow Gulf shelf and decades of coastal development — yet the area had not experienced a direct major-hurricane landfall since a Category 3 storm struck nearby Tarpon Springs in 1921. Major systems including Donna (1960), Charley (2004), Irma (2017) and Ian (2022) each veered away at the last moment, but every near-miss reinforces how much is at stake if a powerful storm follows a direct track into the bay.
The year peaks in August, at 27.3°C over the day and around 31.2°C by mid-afternoon. Around 195 nights a year stay above 20°C. At the other extreme, January averages 15.3°C, with typical overnight lows of 11.2°C. Freezing temperatures almost never occur.
In total, Tampa averages about 1087 mm of precipitation a year; July is usually the wettest month (176 mm) and November the driest (38 mm).
Comparing the record's first decade with its most recent one, Tampa now averages 0.9°C warmer than it did in the 1940s. The count of days past 30°C has risen from roughly 100 a year to 140 between the record's first and last decades.
Climate graph (climograph)
August is the warmest month, January the coolest — a yearly swing of 12°C. Wettest month: July (~176 mm). Whole year averages ~1087 mm of rain.
Bars = average monthly rainfall (right axis). Lines = average daily high and low (left axis). Average = each month's value averaged across every year of record (1940–2026).
Monthly wind
Average daily peak wind at 10 m, by month.
Monthly solar energy
Average daily incoming solar energy in megajoules per square metre — a measured proxy for how sunny the month is.
Tampa month by month — what to expect
Typical conditions for each month, averaged across the full record (since 1940). Daylight is the time from sunrise to sunset. Record high/low are the most extreme values in the ERA5 dataset (modelled since 1940), so they can differ from official weather-station readings.
| Month | Avg high | Avg low | Rain | Daylight | Record high | Record low |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| January | 20.7° | 11.2° | 55 mm | 10.4 h | 28.8° (2002) | -5.3° (1985) |
| February | 21.8° | 12.3° | 58 mm | 11.0 h | 30.7° (2018) | -4.1° (1996) |
| March | 24.2° | 14.6° | 71 mm | 11.8 h | 33.4° (1945) | -0.6° (1980) |
| April | 27.0° | 17.5° | 54 mm | 12.7 h | 33.9° (2017) | 4.7° (1987) |
| May | 29.8° | 20.7° | 66 mm | 13.4 h | 38.9° (1945) | 11.6° (1971) |
| June | 30.8° | 23.6° | 152 mm | 13.8 h | 38.0° (1945) | 12.9° (1984) |
| July | 31.0° | 24.5° | 176 mm | 13.6 h | 35.7° (1964) | 19.1° (1947) |
| August | 31.2° | 24.5° | 174 mm | 13.0 h | 35.4° (2021) | 20.0° (1957) |
| September | 30.6° | 23.5° | 139 mm | 12.2 h | 35.4° (2005) | 15.0° (1981) |
| October | 28.1° | 19.7° | 56 mm | 11.3 h | 33.8° (2020) | 5.3° (2008) |
| November | 24.7° | 15.3° | 38 mm | 10.6 h | 31.8° (2015) | -2.3° (1970) |
| December | 22.0° | 12.6° | 48 mm | 10.2 h | 29.9° (1978) | -7.0° (1962) |
How it has changed
Year-by-year signals from 1940 to today.Climate stripes
Annual mean shifted from 1940–1949 to 2016–2025 by +0.9°C.
Each vertical stripe is one year. Color encodes how much that year's annual mean differed from the long-term average. Average = each year's annual mean compared to the average of all years (1940–2026). cooler ← → warmer
Annual mean temperature
Long-term trend: +0.15°C per decade.
One point per year — the temperature averaged across the whole year. The dashed line is the least-squares long-term trend. Based on ERA5 reanalysis — modelled estimates, not station readings.
Seasonal warming
Sep–Nov is warming fastest: +0.16°C per decade.
Each faint line is one three-month period's average per year; the bold dashed line is its long-term trend. Different parts of the year often warm at different rates. Based on ERA5 reanalysis — modelled estimates, not station readings.
Hot days vs frost days
Days ≥ 30°C per year: 98.4 early in the record → 141.6 recently. Frost days: 0 → 0.
Thin lines are raw yearly counts; thick lines are the smoothed trend that removes year-to-year noise. The hot-day threshold is auto-picked per city so the line actually moves. Average = a centered 5-year rolling average to smooth weather noise.
Yearly hot & cold extremes
All-time high in 1945, all-time low in 1962: 38.9°C / -7.0°C.
One point per year — the single hottest and coldest day recorded that year.
Annual rainfall
~1087 mm/year on average. Last decade ran +21% vs that average. Long-term trend: +28 mm per decade.
One bar per year of total rainfall. Dashed line is the long-term average. Average = the average annual rainfall across every year of record (1940–2026).
Day-by-day grid
Each tiny square is one calendar day across the full record — ~30,000 days per city. Use the mode switch above the chart: Anomaly colors each day by how far it ran from the historical average for that date (red = warmer, blue = cooler), Daily mean temp shows the absolute mean temperature for the day (useful to see seasons and heatwaves), and Precipitation shows daily rainfall (useful to spot wet/dry seasons and droughts). Average = the long-term average for that calendar date (1940–2026).