PORTO AND THE NORTH · NOVEMBER · 41.2° N
November in Porto is mild, wet and short on light: an average high of 62.2°F, an average low of 48.9°F, and 6.53 inches of rain over the month at the airport gauge. Nothing freezes and nothing bakes. What the date takes away is dry afternoons and daylight, and what it hands back is a version of Ribeira, the Gaia port lodges and the Douro line best seen from a table by a window.
The north is not one climate, though, and the difference matters before you pack. Every figure here comes from a thermometer on the coast, while the Gerês uplands and the inland Douro terraces run colder and considerably wetter. Read these numbers as Porto’s, then add a layer for anything above the river.
THE MONTH AT A GLANCE · PORTO AND THE NORTH
Come for indoor Porto, the Gaia cellars and one Douro day held loose: November averages 62.2°F by day and 48.9°F at night, with measurable rain on 13 days and the sun gone by 5:16 p.m.
AVG HIGH 62.2°F · 13 RAIN DAYS · 9 H 55 MIN OF DAYLIGHT ON NOV 15
Go for: port lodge visits on the Gaia bank, tiled interiors, long lunches, and afternoons that still average 62.2°F on the coast.
Think twice before: planning a Gerês hiking week or a beach day on these coastal numbers: 6.53 inches falls across 13 days, and higher ground is colder and wetter.
Normals: IPMA station 545, Porto Pedras Rubras, 1991–2020 · Daylight: sunrise-sunset.org · full sources at the end
On this page
- Porto weather in NovemberHighs of 62.2°F, 6.53 inches and 13 rain days
- How cold the nights getLows of 48.9°F, and what we could not verify about frost
- Crowds, prices and the tourist taxWhat we can price, and what we cannot
- Things to do in Porto in NovemberRibeira, the Gaia lodges, Guimarães and Braga
- A two-day plan for short daylightSunrise at 7:21, sunset at 5:16
- November vs October and DecemberHow the three months compare, degree by degree
- Is November a good time to visit?Who should go, who should shift four weeks
Anything that is not dated by the month lives elsewhere in the cocoon: the city itself in our Porto guide, the year as a whole in the best-time verdict, the driving question in the car guide.
Porto and the North weather in November: average highs, lows and rain days
| November at Porto Pedras Rubras | 1991–2020 normal |
|---|---|
| Average high | 62.2°F (16.8°C) |
| Average low | 48.9°F (9.4°C) |
| Precipitation | 6.53 in |
| Days with 0.04 in (1 mm) or more | 13.0 |
| Days with 0.39 in (10 mm) or more | 5.9 |
| Daylight on November 15 | 9 h 55 min |
| Sunrise / sunset, November 15 | 7:21 a.m. / 5:16 p.m. |
The normals below come from IPMA, the Portuguese national weather service, and specifically from station 545 at Porto Pedras Rubras, the airport, where the instrument sits 67.7 m above sea level. Over 1991 to 2020 the November average high is 62.2°F (16.8°C), the average low 48.9°F (9.4°C), and the month collects 6.53 inches of rain. Those are station readings from a real thermometer, not a model grid cell, and they describe the coastal plain rather than the whole region.
Measurable rain falls on 13.0 days in an average November, close to four days in ten. IPMA counts a day once it logs at least 1 mm (0.04 inch), a lower bar than the 0.10-inch threshold most US tables use, so the two counts are not interchangeable. The flip side of 13 is 17: seventeen days record nothing at all. Atlantic fronts move through in bands, so a wet breakfast does not settle what the evening does.
Day and night sit 13.3°F apart, a small enough gap that one good layer covers both ends. Bring a waterproof shell rather than a heavy coat, shoes that handle wet granite on Porto’s slopes, and a sweater for 48.9°F at the tram stop after dinner. An umbrella beats a hood when the wind comes off the river, and our packing guide has the full autumn list.
On November 15 the sun rises at 7:21 a.m. and sets at 5:16 p.m., for 9 hours 55 minutes of daylight. Portugal runs on UTC through the winter, so those are the times your phone will show. The practical effect lands in the afternoon: a 3 p.m. start on the Gaia bank catches low light over the bridge, and anything you wanted photographed at the river has to happen before five.
How warm is Porto and the North in November?
Those two figures, 62.2°F and 48.9°F, average thirty Novembers of daily maxima and minima. They are not the temperature of your Tuesday. The high is a mid-afternoon peak that holds for a couple of hours, the low a pre-dawn reading you will meet only if you are chasing an early train. Real days swing either side of both, and a still, sunny hour on the Ribeira quay feels warmer than the number suggests.
Mornings want a jacket, afternoons often do not. Leave with a layer you can carry, shed it around noon when the sky cooperates, and put it back on at sunset. Across the water the port lodges keep their cellars cool whatever the month is doing outside, so the sweater is not optional for a tasting, and neither are dry shoes for the walk back over the bridge.
We found no frost-night count for Porto, so we give no number of them. An average low of 48.9°F sits well above freezing and the ocean moderates this station, but an average is not a floor, and a clear, still night inland runs colder. We could not verify a sea-surface reading for this coast either, so we quote no water temperature. Where sea figures are published, they usually average daily maxima, a touch warmer than a full 24-hour mean.
How busy is Porto and the North in November? Crowds, prices and the tourist tax
November falls between the autumn shoulder and the December holidays. That placement is a calendar fact, not a price: we found no occupancy series and no monthly room-rate series for Porto, so we crown no month cheap and no month expensive. What a week in the country actually costs, in the pieces we can price, sits on our trip-cost page.
Booking behaves differently in a month where the sky does the scheduling. We could not verify fare or occupancy data, so we give no lead time in weeks. The workable approach is to lock the two things that are hard to move, the flight and the bed, and keep the daytime loose, since a clear Douro day is worth reshuffling for. Our flights guide covers the routes in.
If a municipal per-night charge applies to your stay, it will not be inside the room rate you saw online. We could not verify the rate for Porto, so we quote no amount and no percentage. Ask the property what it adds at checkout before you compare two quotes, because that line is where a cheap-looking booking and an expensive one can swap places.
One line item genuinely changes this month, and it is location rather than luxury. Thirteen rainy days turn every extra half-mile into a negotiation, and a room in the historic core or on the Gaia bank means you walk home from dinner instead of hunting a car in the rain. Spend there before you spend on square footage, and let the where-to-stay guide sort the bases.
Things to do in Porto and the North in November: Ribeira, the Gaia lodges and Guimarães
November lets you build a trip around interiors without it feeling like a consolation prize. With 9 hours 55 minutes of daylight and rain on 13 days, the cellars, the tiled halls and the three-hour lunch become the plan and the sunshine becomes the bonus. In July that order runs the other way, and the good indoor rooms are what you skip.
Names worth a November list: the Ribeira quay and the upper deck of the Dom Luís I bridge, the port lodges across the water in Vila Nova de Gaia, the azulejo hall at São Bento station, the Sé on its terrace above the old town, and the Serralves grounds when the sky allows. Out of town, Guimarães and Braga sit an easy train ride away, and the Douro Valley is the day that wants the clearest forecast. Check each operator’s November hours and admission before you build an afternoon on it.
Bom Jesus above Braga, the Gerês hills and the Douro terraces all sit higher and further inland than a runway at 67.7 m, and IPMA is blunt about what that does: high ground is colder and far wetter than the coastal station reads. A cellar in Gaia is indifferent to the date. A viewpoint above the valley is not, and that gap between 62.2°F on the coast and whatever the terrace is doing is the thing to dress for.
Free this month means outdoors: the walk along the Ribeira quay, the crossing on the bridge’s upper deck with the gorge underneath, the Gaia riverbank at dusk, the seafront at Matosinhos when the swell is up. We could not verify any November-only free admission in the city, so plan the no-cost hours around the gaps between the rain bands rather than around a promotion.
Porto and the North in November: a two-day itinerary
Day one runs with the light. Coffee before the 7:21 a.m. sunrise if your flight dictates it, São Bento’s tiled hall by nine, the Sé and the lanes downhill to Ribeira by eleven, then a sit-down lunch indoors through the middle of the day. Cross the bridge on the upper deck at two, take a port lodge on the Gaia bank at three, and be back by the water for whatever the 5:16 p.m. sunset delivers. Dinner starts late in Porto, so the evening is longer than the day.
Day two goes out of town or stays put, depending on the sky. Clear: the Douro Valley by train, accepting that the whole round trip fits inside 9 hours 55 minutes of daylight, so pick one stop rather than three. Wet: Guimarães or Braga, where a castle, a few churches and a café absorb an afternoon that has no horizon anyway. If the forecast flips overnight, swap the two at breakfast.
Porto and the North in November vs October and December
| 1991–2020 normal | October | November | December |
|---|---|---|---|
| Average high | 69.3°F | 62.2°F | 58.5°F |
| Average low | 55.2°F | 48.9°F | 45.7°F |
| Precipitation | 5.86 in | 6.53 in | 6.04 in |
| Days with 0.04 in or more | 11.1 | 13.0 | 12.4 |
The temperature falls down an uneven staircase. October averages 69.3°F by day and 55.2°F at night, November 62.2 and 48.9, December 58.5 and 45.7, so the step from October into November is 7.1°F of afternoon, nearly twice the 3.7°F December then removes. Rain refuses to follow that line: November is the wettest of the three at 6.53 inches over 13.0 rain days, ahead of December’s 6.04 inches and 12.4 days and October’s 5.86 inches and 11.1 days.
Move four weeks earlier and you buy 7.1°F of afternoon and two fewer rainy days, with October reading off the same IPMA station. Move four weeks later and you give up another 3.7°F, keep essentially the same rain, and trade autumn for the run-up to Christmas. The month in the middle is the one that concedes the most water for the least warmth, and the one where the indoor half of Porto is strongest.
Is November a good time to visit Porto and the North?
Yes, if the trip is built on interiors, food and a city you cross on foot. Mild 62.2°F afternoons, cellars across the river and a good reason to take a two-hour lunch seriously add up to a full week. No, if you pictured beach days, a hiking week in Gerês or a Douro drive with a guaranteed view: 13 rainy days out of 30 make the guaranteed view the one thing the month cannot promise.
For that second traveler, October is the closest fix rather than a different trip: 69.3°F by day, 55.2°F at night, 11.1 rainy days instead of 13.0, and 5.86 inches instead of 6.53. Going the other way solves nothing, since December is colder at 58.5°F and only marginally drier at 6.04 inches.
November alone among the three pairs a mild 62.2°F afternoon with the wettest sky of the autumn, which makes it the month when Porto’s cellars and tiled rooms are the main event instead of the shelter.
The last word
Book the bed within walking distance of dinner, leave day two unassigned until the night before, and let the forecast choose between the Douro and Braga. Carry one more number while you decide: of November’s 13 rainy days, 5.9 bring at least 0.39 inch, so about one day in five is properly wet rather than merely damp. That is the day you spend on the Gaia bank with a glass of tawny in front of you.
Sources & data for this guide
- November normals (62.2°F high, 48.9°F low, 6.53 in) and rain-day counts (13.0 days at 0.04 in, 5.9 at 0.39 in) · IPMA, 1991–2020 normals, station 545 Porto Pedras Rubras, 67.7 m · checked Sep 24, 2026
- October and December normals used in the comparison · same IPMA station, same 1991–2020 period · checked Sep 24, 2026
- Sunrise 7:21 a.m., sunset 5:16 p.m. and 9 h 55 min of daylight on November 15 · sunrise-sunset.org · checked Sep 24, 2026
- Scope caveat from IPMA: the station sits at Porto’s coastal airport. Inland and upland northern Portugal runs colder and far wetter, and these numbers do not describe it.
- We found no occupancy or monthly room-rate series for Porto, no municipal tourist-tax rate we could confirm, and no sea-surface temperature we could source, so we quote none of the three.
- Opening hours and admission at individual sites are not something we verified, and they change seasonally · check operators when you book.
To plan your stay
- Things to Do in Porto and the North: Port Lodges, Bom Jesus, Guimarães, Surf and Peneda-Gerês
- Best Time to Visit Porto and the North: Weather, Rain Days and the Quiet Months
- Porto and the North in October: Weather, Rain Days, Crowds and a 2-Day Itinerary
- Porto and the North in December: Weather, Rain Days and Short Daylight