Best Time to Visit St. Augustine: Month-by-Month Weather, Sea Temperature and the Months to Skip

ST. AUGUSTINE · FLORIDA · 29.9° N

St. Augustine sells itself in coquina and shade: a Spanish fort on the bayfront, narrow colonial lanes off St. George Street, and Atlantic beach across the Bridge of Lions. What it does not sell is a single season. The town at 65°F in January and the town at 92°F in July ask for two different trips, two different wardrobes, two different daily plans.

Florida splits its year into a dry half and a wet one, and this stretch of the northeast coast follows the split closely. The complication for visitors is that the warm water and the heavy rain arrive together. Choosing a month means deciding which of the two you want more.

On this page

• St. Augustine weather month by monthThe twelve-month table: highs, rain, sea
• The best month to visitApril, with the numbers behind it
• When the ocean is warm enough to swimMay through October, 75°F and up
• The quietest weeks of the yearJanuary to mid-February, and after Labor Day
• The month to book carefullySeptember and the September 10 peak
• Spring and fall trade-offsMarch, April, October, November compared

The town is compact enough that weather runs the day. The fort, the colonial lanes and the beaches sit within a short drive of one another, and almost none of it offers shade at midday, which is why a six-degree difference in the average high changes the shape of an afternoon here.

St. Augustine weather month by month: highs, lows, rain and sea

The year has one clean shape: a mild, dry stretch from October to May, and a hot, soaking one from June to September that collects 28.81 of the year’s 53.40 inches of rain in four months. Every month above 85°F is also a month above 3.4 inches. Comfort and warm water never quite overlap.

Two hinges do most of the work. Between May and June the rain more than doubles, from 3.42 to 7.60 inches, and wet days jump from 4.6 to 9.7 while the average high climbs 4.0°F to 89.9°F. The reverse hinge falls between September and October: rain drops from 7.56 to 4.03 inches, wet days from 8.4 to 5.1, and the average high loses 6.3°F.

August is the hardest month for anyone who came to walk. Days average 90.8°F, nights barely relent at a 73.4°F low, and 10.3 days record 0.10 inch or more, the highest wet-day count of the year. For a beach-and-pool family that hardly registers. For a couple planning three hours in a fort courtyard and a walking tour of the old town, it changes the itinerary.

One caveat about the source. Every figure here for air temperature and rain comes from NOAA’s 1991-2020 normals at station USW00013889, which is Jacksonville International Airport, north of town and set back from the water. Coastal St. Augustine runs slightly milder at both ends. The sea column is a separate series entirely, from the Open-Meteo Marine archive, averaged over 2015-2024.

When is the best time to visit St. Augustine?

For a traveler with no fixed agenda, take April. The average high is 79.8°F, the low 56.4°F, rain totals 2.93 inches across 4.4 wet days, and April 15 delivers 12 hours 58 minutes of daylight with the sun up at 6:56 AM and down at 7:53 PM. That combination lets you walk the old town at noon and still see the lighthouse before dinner.

May offers better swimming, at 77.6°F against April’s 71.8°F, but pays 6.1°F on the average high and puts you at 85.9°F on the fort’s shadeless glacis. March runs 5.5°F cooler by day than April, records 5.6 wet days (the highest count outside summer), and leaves the water at 67.6°F. April sits between the two problems rather than choosing one.

That verdict matches the state’s wider pattern, with warmer edges further south: our Florida calendar puts the dry season from November to April, and the same window governs a driving loop or a stop here on the way to Miami. Nothing about April is a secret locally, so book lodging early for Easter week.

When can you swim in St. Augustine? Sea temperature month by month

The water crosses 75°F from May to October: 77.6°F in May, 82.2°F in June, a peak of 84.5°F in July, 84.0°F in August, 83.7°F in September and 77.9°F in October. April (71.8°F) and November (72.7°F) are bracing but usable, and November is the warmer of the two by 0.9°F. From December to March the sea holds between 62.6°F and 67.6°F, which is surfing in a wetsuit or a long walk.

Read those numbers with one correction. They are averages of daily maxima over 2015-2024, so each figure sits a shade above a true 24-hour mean, and the ocean you meet at 8 AM will be cooler than the table suggests. Wind direction matters more than the monthly average anyway: a few days of hard offshore breeze can pull the shallows down several degrees in June.

When is St. Augustine quietest?

Two hollows, both drawn by the school calendar rather than by the thermometer. The first runs from the week after New Year to mid-February, once the holiday visitors have gone and before spring break fills the beach motels in March. The second is the stretch between Labor Day and Thanksgiving week, minus the holiday itself. Those are low-season weeks by the calendar, which is a fact about who is in town.

January is what you gain: 65.5°F days, the Castillo photographed without a queue, a table on a Saturday night, and parking that stops being a negotiation. Rain is a smaller obstacle than visitors expect at 3.28 inches over 5.2 wet days, and it tends to arrive with cold fronts that clear by afternoon rather than as a daily storm.

What you lose is the water and the light. The sea averages 62.6°F, 6.2 January nights drop to 32°F or below, and January 15 offers 10 hours 29 minutes of daylight, sunrise 7:20 AM, sunset 5:48 PM. February trims the freezing nights to 2.7 and adds 1.2°F to the ocean, which is not enough to change anyone’s swimsuit plans.

Which month should you avoid in St. Augustine?

September asks for the most caution, and the reason is the calendar rather than the heat. The Atlantic hurricane season runs June 1 to November 30, peaks on September 10, and concentrates most of its activity between mid-August and mid-October. Add 7.56 inches of rain over 8.4 wet days with the average high still at 87.2°F, and anyone traveling on fixed dates with a nonrefundable booking is buying risk they can price.

It redeems itself for the flexible. The sea holds 83.7°F, warmer than October’s 77.9°F, the beaches empty out after Labor Day, and September 15 still gives 12 hours 22 minutes of daylight, sunset at 7:31 PM. Book refundable rooms, watch the tropics the week before you fly, and read the state’s storm-season rules before you commit.

Is the shoulder season worth it in St. Augustine?

The shoulders here are March to April and October to November. Measured against the summer peak, October runs 11.0°F cooler than July by day (80.9°F against 91.9°F) and cuts wet days from 9.9 to 5.1. November is the driest month of the whole year at 2.00 inches, just over a quarter of June’s 7.60, with 3.9 wet days.

What that buys is a usable middle of the day. In October and April you can spend three hours in the old town, cross to Anastasia Island, climb the lighthouse and still want dinner outdoors. In July, the same program becomes a morning, a long air-conditioned gap and an evening, which is a real constraint for families working around nap schedules.

The shoulder takes back water and light. November’s sea sits at 72.7°F, 11.3°F below August, and November 15 gives 10 hours 41 minutes of daylight against July’s 13 hours 55, with the sun gone by 5:30 PM. March keeps the ocean at 67.6°F, records those 5.6 wet days, and carries spring-break crowds through much of the month.

So the trade splits by purpose. If the trip is built on the ocean, summer earns its rain. If it is built on the fort, the lanes and the food, take the shoulder without hesitating. October is the one month that serves both, at 77.9°F water and 5.1 wet days, and its single defect is the tail of the storm season running to mid-October.

The last word

Take April if you want one month and no argument, October if the trip is built around the water, January if you want the colonial streets to yourself and can live with a 62.6°F ocean. One line for the budget in any month: St. Johns County levies a 5.0% transient rental tax on top of the 6% state sales tax, filed together on every night you book. Then walk St. George Street at 8 AM, before the tour groups.

Sources & data for this guide

• Monthly normals for temperature, precipitation, wet days and freezing nights · NOAA NCEI 1991-2020, station USW00013889 (Jacksonville International Airport) · checked Sep 10, 2026
• Sea surface temperatures, given as means of daily maxima · Open-Meteo Marine API, 2015-2024 average · checked Sep 10, 2026
• Daylight length, sunrise and sunset on the 15th of each month, converted to America/New_York · sunrise-sunset.org · checked Sep 10, 2026
• Hurricane season dates and the September 10 peak · NOAA National Hurricane Center · checked Sep 10, 2026
• Transient rental tax (5.0%) and state sales tax · Florida Department of Revenue, form DR-15TDT · checked Sep 10, 2026
• The crowd calendar is editorial: no public series tracks St. Augustine visitor numbers by month, so the quiet weeks above are drawn from school holidays and the state’s seasons, not from a dataset.