Ericeira in December: Weather, Rain Days and How It Compares to November and January

ERICEIRA · DECEMBER · THE MONTH IN NUMBERS

December in Ericeira averages 58.8°F by afternoon and 47.7°F before dawn, with 3.94 inches of rain falling across roughly ten days of the month. The Atlantic keeps working all winter, the surf schools keep running, and the town goes back to the people who live in it. What you trade for that is light: on December 15 the sun comes up at 7:46 a.m. and drops behind the ocean at 5:17 p.m., leaving 9 hours 31 minutes to spend.

The coast itself does not change. The cliff path, the harbor, the beach sequence from Praia dos Pescadores north to Ribeira d’Ilhas all sit where they sat in July. December changes the air over them, the hours you get and how often a front interrupts. If you are still choosing a month rather than planning one, our 12-month verdict for Portugal takes the wider view, and the Ericeira guide handles the town year-round.

On this page

• Ericeira weather in December58.8°F highs, 3.94 inches, 9.7 rain days
• How warm it gets, and what to wearThe 11-degree gap between dawn and afternoon
• Crowds, prices and booking lead timeWhat we could price, and what we could not
• Things to do on a rainy December dayRibeira d’Ilhas, the cliff path, Mafra
• A two-day plan around 9h 31m of daylightDay one and day two, hour by hour
• December vs November and JanuaryHow the three months compare
• Is December a good time to visit?Our verdict, for and against

Every figure here comes from IPMA’s 1991-2020 normals for station 579, Lisboa Gago Coutinho: a real thermometer at 103.9 m on the inland side of the hills, not a model grid cell. Ericeira sits on an exposed Atlantic shore, so expect more wind at the water than the station records, and expect colder and far wetter numbers if your day takes you onto high ground inland. Pack for the coast you are standing on.

Ericeira weather in December: average highs, lows and rain days

IPMA, the Portuguese national weather service, puts December on this stretch of coast at 58.8°F by day and 47.7°F by night, with 3.94 inches of rain. Those are 1991-2020 normals from station 579, Lisboa Gago Coutinho, read off an instrument standing at 103.9 m. A reanalysis grid cell would smooth the same month into a modeled estimate, so we serve the thermometer and say where it sits.

Measurable rain shows up on 9.7 days in an average December, close to one day in three, and 3.5 of those bring 0.39 inch or more. Careful with the counts: IPMA uses 1 mm and 10 mm thresholds, not the 0.10-inch threshold American tables use, so the numbers are not interchangeable with a US weather page. Atlantic fronts tend to arrive, empty themselves and move on, which makes the half-day the useful planning unit rather than the day.

Eleven degrees separate the average night from the average afternoon, a narrow winter spread and a kind one for packing. One warm mid-layer, a genuinely waterproof hooded shell and shoes you do not mind soaking will cover the month. Wind is the variable no station reading gives you: on the clifftops a 58.8°F afternoon feels several degrees colder than the same reading in a sheltered street. Our Portugal packing guide has the full list.

On December 15 the sun rises at 7:46 a.m. and sets at 5:17 p.m. local time, for 9 hours 31 minutes. Portugal keeps UTC through the winter, so the clock and the sun agree without arithmetic. The practical effect is that the good light sits at both ends of a short day: the harbor is lit by eight, and by half past five you are choosing a restaurant instead of a beach.

How warm is Ericeira in December?

The month tops out at 58.8°F and bottoms at 47.7°F, an 11.1-degree gap between a typical dawn and a typical mid-afternoon. For the water we came up empty: no sea-surface series for Ericeira passed our checks, so we publish no number. Where sea temperatures do circulate for this coast, they are usually averages of daily maxima, which run a little warmer than a 24-hour mean. Read any figure you find with that in mind.

Mornings want the mid-layer zipped, since 47.7°F with Atlantic damp in it bites harder than the same reading inland. By two in the afternoon the shell usually comes off in the sun and goes straight back on in the shade. Surfers wear winter rubber all month, boots included, and the schools in town rent it along with the board.

We could not verify a count of nights at or below freezing on this coast, so we give none. What the normals do say is that the average December low sits at 47.7°F, 15.7 degrees above freezing. IPMA’s own caveat applies to the rest of the region: high ground inland runs colder and far wetter than the reading you have here.

How busy is Ericeira in December? Crowds, prices and booking lead time

December falls outside the summer beach season by the calendar, and the winter population of the town is largely its own. We found no occupancy series and no monthly room-rate series for Ericeira, so we crown no month cheapest and no month dearest. What the month does guarantee is space: 9 hours 31 minutes of daylight over a coast that nobody is queuing for.

On booking, what we can say is structural rather than statistical. The two fixed dates in the month are December 25 and December 31, and those are the nights we would lock first if they fall inside your trip. For an ordinary midweek stay in the first three weeks, the decision you are making is which street you want, not whether a room exists at all.

We could not verify a nightly tourist tax for Ericeira, so we quote no rate and no cap. Ask your property what it collects and whether it is already inside the quoted price, and settle it at check-in. For the wider budget picture across the country, what a week in Portugal costs does the arithmetic we can support.

The one upgrade that genuinely changes December is location. With the light gone at 5:17 p.m. and rain on roughly a third of days, a room you can walk from to dinner and back beats a view you will only see for nine and a half hours a day. A car opens the coast road and the drive inland, and our rental guide covers tolls and pickup, but the December premium worth paying is on walking distance.

Things to do in Ericeira in December: beaches, the cliff path and indoor options

December gives you the beach sequence to yourself at noon. Ribeira d’Ilhas, Praia de São Sebastião, Praia do Sul and Foz do Lizandro all sit within an easy day of the center, and the cliff path linking them is at its best in the middle hours, once the air has climbed toward 58.8°F. Nothing about that is possible in the same way when the same sand is a summer car park.

The named stops are short ones. Ribeira d’Ilhas is the surf beach north of town, with a natural amphitheater of cliffs above the lineup. Praia dos Pescadores is the working harbor beach in the center, Praia do Sul the sheltered one below the old streets, Foz do Lizandro the wide river-mouth beach to the south. Inland, Mafra’s palace and its monastery library make the indoor afternoon, and we did not verify their winter hours or admission, so confirm before you drive.

December does not move the coastline. It moves the air over it: 58.8°F by mid-afternoon, 47.7°F before dawn, and 9 hours 31 minutes between them on the 15th. A beach walk becomes a jacket walk, the sand stays empty past noon, and the lineups belong to people in full winter rubber. Rain lands on 9.7 days of the month, so the flexible plan wins over the fixed one.

The free list is the long one. The cliff path, the harbor wall and every beach above take no ticket, and the 5:17 p.m. sunset off Praia do Sul arrives early enough to watch before dinner rather than after it. Two coastal neighbors make easy December day trips for the price of the drive: Nazaré north, Sintra inland.

Ericeira in December: a two-day itinerary

Day one. First light lands around 7:46 a.m., so take breakfast in town and walk north toward Ribeira d’Ilhas while the air is still near its 47.7°F end. Be back for lunch by one. Give the warmest stretch, roughly noon to three, to the cliff path and the beaches south toward Foz do Lizandro. Watch the light go from Praia do Sul at 5:17 p.m., then eat at seven, which is when the town eats.

Day two. Point the morning inland to Mafra’s palace and library, both indoors and both warm, then come back for the last hours of light on the harbor. If a front arrives instead, treat it like any of December’s 9.7 wet days: move the walk into the gap behind the rain, stretch lunch while it passes, and keep the afternoon loose. On the 3.5 days a month that deliver 0.39 inch or more, check the morning forecast before committing to anything outdoors.

Ericeira in December vs November and January

November runs 63.7°F by day and 52.2°F by night, December 58.8 and 47.7, January 57.9 and 46.0. Rain totals fall steadily across the three: 4.51 inches, then 3.94, then 3.78. Rain days climb the other way, 9.3 to 9.7 to 9.9. So November’s water arrives in fewer and heavier visits while December spreads a smaller total more thinly, and none of the three months gave us a sea temperature we were willing to publish.

Shift four weeks earlier and you buy 4.9 degrees on the afternoon and 4.5 on the night, paid for with 0.57 inch more rain. Shift four weeks later and January takes back only 0.9 degrees of the day, adds two-tenths of a rain day and sits marginally drier at 3.78 inches. Between December and January the normals barely separate, so the deciding factors are the holiday fortnight and the light, and our January page picks it up from there.

Is December a good time to visit Ericeira?

Yes for surfers, walkers and anyone who would rather have a coastline than a beach club. Afternoons at 58.8°F and rain on about a third of days suit a trip built around a morning walk, a long lunch and a plan that can move by an hour. No for a swimming holiday: we have no verified water temperature to hand you, and the day shuts down at 5:17 p.m.

If warmth and light are what you are after, November is the nearest fix, with 63.7°F afternoons and 52.2°F nights, bought at 4.51 inches of rain and the same nine-odd wet days. For real warmth you need to leave the winter behind altogether, and the 12-month view of Portugal puts the summer coast in order. Waiting for January gains you nothing: 57.9°F and 9.9 rain days.

No other month pairs the year’s shortest daylight with afternoons still averaging 58.8°F: a fleece, a 9 hours 31 minutes window, and a coast you have largely to yourself in the middle of it.

The last word

Book the bed you can walk home to and stop optimizing the rest, because December in Ericeira rewards the trip that decides its day at breakfast. One figure to carry with you: January’s nights average 46.0°F, a mere 1.7 degrees below December’s, so holding out for the next month buys nothing warmer. Pack the waterproof shell, lock December 25 and 31 early if they are in your dates, and let the 5:17 p.m. sunset set your dinner time.

Sources & data for this guide

• December, November and January normals, 1991-2020 (highs, lows, precipitation, rain days) · IPMA, station 579 Lisboa Gago Coutinho, altitude 103.9 m · checked Sep 23, 2026
• Rain-day thresholds of 1 mm and 10 mm, not the 0.10-inch threshold used by US tables · IPMA climate normals documentation · checked Sep 23, 2026
• Daylight, sunrise 7:46 and sunset 17:17 UTC on December 15, converted to local time · sunrise-sunset.org · checked Sep 23, 2026
• Sea temperature: we found no sea-surface series for Ericeira we could verify, so we publish no water figure for any of the three months.
• Crowds and prices: we found no occupancy series and no monthly room-rate series for Ericeira, and we could not verify a nightly tourist tax, so we give no rate and no ranking.
• Station caveat: the normals are measured inland at Lisbon’s airport station, while Ericeira is an exposed Atlantic shore, and high ground inland runs colder and wetter.
• Beach names, the cliff path and the palace at Mafra are editorial; winter hours and admission change, so check operators before you drive.

To plan your stay

• Best Time to Visit Ericeira: Month-by-Month Weather, Rain Days and the Quiet Season
• Ericeira in January: Weather, Rain Days, Daylight and How It Compares to December and February
• Ericeira in November: Weather, Rain Days, Crowds and a Two-Day Plan
• Ericeira in February: 60°F Highs, 7.8 Rain Days and a Surf Coast at Local Size

Nearby places

• Cascais, Portugal: the Town Beaches, Guincho and Where to Stay
• Sintra, Portugal: Pena, Regaleira, Tickets and the One-Day Plan
• Pena Palace Tickets and Visit Guide: Prices, Time Slots and Crowd Strategy