Faro in September: Weather, Sea Temperature and How It Compares to August

FARO · SEPTEMBER · IPMA STATION 554

Faro’s thermometer comes down slowly. The September average high is 79.5°F (26.4°C) against 84.6°F in August, the average low settles at 64.9°F, and rain reappears in the record without taking over: 0.85 inches across 1.9 days that register at least 1 mm. Offshore, the water averages 65.4°F. Those five readings decide most of what a September week in Faro feels like, from what you carry at dinner to how long you last in the Atlantic.

You have already chosen the town, so the question is the date. September keeps the beach afternoons and hands back the worst of the midday heat, then asks for one rain shell and a slightly earlier last swim. Which Algarve base suits you, and which month suits Portugal as a whole, live in our Algarve guide and the month-by-month verdict.

On this page

• Average highs, lows and rain daysThe IPMA normals for September
• Sea temperature in September65.4°F, and how that figure is measured
• Crowds and prices after the August peakWhat we can price and what we cannot
• Things to do in Faro in SeptemberThe old town, the lagoon and the sand islands
• A two-day plan built around the lightHour by hour, 07:13 to 19:40
• September vs August vs OctoberThe three months in one table
• Is September a good month for Faro?Who it suits, and who should shift dates
• Faro in AugustThe hotter, drier month before

The normals below are dated to September and measured at Faro itself, not averaged across the region. Where a fact belongs to the whole coast, to the car, or to the flight over, we send you to the page that owns it: rentals and tolls, flights from the US, what a Portugal trip costs.

Faro weather in September: average highs, lows and rain days

Every figure here comes from IPMA, the Portuguese national weather service, read at station 554 in Faro, a real thermometer 5.0 m above sea level rather than a model grid cell. Over the 1991-2020 reference period the September average high is 79.5°F (26.4°C), the average low 64.9°F (18.3°C), and the month collects 0.85 inches of rain. Those readings describe the eastern Algarve coast and nothing wider: higher ground inland runs colder and far wetter, and the far end of the coast keeps its own weather.

Measurable rain stays rare enough to plan around. IPMA counts 1.9 days in an average September at 1 mm (0.04 inch) or more, and 0.7 day at 10 mm (0.39 inch) or more, which over a decade works out to seven genuinely wet afternoons spread across ten Septembers. One caveat matters when you compare tables: American sources usually start counting at 0.10 inch, so a US-style rain-day count for Faro is not interchangeable with this one.

Day to night, the spread runs 14.6°F. Midday sits in the high 70s and the small hours fall to the mid 60s, which means a light sweater at an outdoor table and nothing heavier in the suitcase. Swim gear dries overnight in this air. A rain shell folds small and covers the two wet days; our packing guide has the rest of the list for a week on this coast.

On September 15 Faro gets 12 hours 27 minutes of daylight, with the sun up at 07:13 and down at 19:40 local time. That leaves a swimmable late afternoon and puts dinner comfortably after dark. Anyone driving back from Tavira or Lagos should count on headlights from around 20:00, which is worth knowing before you book a table at the far end of the coast.

Can you swim in Faro in September? Sea temperature and what it feels like

The sea surface off Faro averages 65.4°F (18.6°C) in September, from the Open-Meteo Marine series over 2015-2024. Read the number carefully: it is the mean of daily maxima, the warmest point of each day, so it sits a shade above a true 24-hour average. Water at eight in the morning is cooler than 65.4°F, and the figure is a decade-long mean rather than a forecast for your week.

Against 79.5°F of air, that water is a 14.1-degree step, and you feel it on entry rather than after ten minutes. A twenty-minute swim needs nothing. An hour of snorkeling or a long session on a board asks for a shorty wetsuit, and rental desks on the beach stock them. Children generally last longer in the shallows than the adults who brought them.

We could not verify a monthly wind or swell series for the Faro coast, so we give no figures for either. What the geography does guarantee is two different swims on the same day: Faro faces the Atlantic from behind a chain of sand islands, with sheltered lagoon water on one side and open ocean on the other. Serious surf sits further west, and the Sagres end of the coast is where that trip belongs.

How busy is Faro in September? Crowds, prices and the demand peak

September follows the year’s busiest weeks, and that is a calendar fact, not a measured one. We found no occupancy series and no monthly room-rate series for Faro, so we crown no month cheap and no month expensive. What the record does show is the weather peak moving on: August’s 84.6°F highs are the summer the charter flights are sold against, and September gives 5.1°F of that heat back while keeping the beach open.

Book the car before the room. Faro airport is the Algarve’s single gateway, and our own working rule of thumb is to lock the vehicle four to six weeks out (est.), then the beds, then the restaurants you actually care about. Flights from the US almost always connect through Lisbon, which adds a leg to price into both the budget and the first day: the flights guide has the routings.

Portugal’s municipal tourist taxes are set locally, and we could not verify a current rate for Faro, so no percentage and no per-night amount appear here. Expect a small nightly line on the final bill and read the property’s own terms at booking. For the wider arithmetic of a week, beds, meals, fuel and tolls together, our trip-cost guide does the sums.

One line of the budget genuinely changes this month: the boat out to the barrier islands. With sunset at 19:40 and rain on only 1.9 days, the late crossing is available nearly every afternoon, and a small-group departure puts you on the sand at the hour the shared midday boats have left. We could not verify fares, so compare operators at the quay before you commit.

Things to do in Faro in September

The old town is walkable at noon in September in a way it is not four weeks earlier. 79.5°F under the walls beats 84.6°F, and the rain that turns October boardwalk plans into a gamble has not arrived: 0.85 inches here against 2.20 inches and 6.0 wet days next month. A walking morning and a beach afternoon fit on the same day, repeatedly, which is exactly the combination October stops guaranteeing.

Inside the walls, the Cidade Velha puts the Arco da Vila gate, the cathedral with its climbable bell tower and the bone chapel at the Igreja do Carmo within a few streets of each other. Out on the water, the Ria Formosa spreads behind the sand: Ilha Deserta at the outer edge, Ilha do Farol under its lighthouse, and Praia de Faro reached by road across the causeway past the airport.

Across August, September and October the sea moves less than two degrees, 66.8°F to 65.4°F to 67.3°F, while the air falls 10.7°F from one end of that run to the other. What you feel on a barrier island in September is in the air, not the water. Carry a layer for the boat even in mid-afternoon, and treat the cathedral tower as a morning job rather than a 3 p.m. one.

What costs nothing: the circuit inside the walls, the marina front, the lagoon boardwalks and the sand at Praia de Faro, all of them usable from 07:13 to 19:40. We could not verify any free-admission day at Faro’s museums or churches, so we name none; assume the bell tower and the bone chapel both charge, and carry coins for the desks.

Faro in September: a two-day itinerary

Day one starts with the sun at 07:13. Coffee on the marina by 08:30, then the old town while the stone is still cool: cathedral tower first, bone chapel second, out through the Arco da Vila before noon. Take an early-afternoon boat to the islands, swim through the warmest stretch of the sea day, and come back for dinner after dark, which in September means after 19:40 with a light layer against a 64.9°F night.

Day two runs the other way: beach first thing, lunch in town, then the car east to Tavira or west toward Lagos, home before headlights around 20:00. If the sky turns, and it does on roughly two days a month, the indoor version is the municipal museum in the old convent (hours unverified, check before you go), the market and a long lunch. A 10 mm day falls in about seven Septembers out of ten, so the contingency costs one afternoon.

Faro in September vs August and October

Set the three side by side and the air does all the moving. Highs run 84.6°F, 79.5°F, 73.9°F. Rain goes 0.12 inches, 0.85, 2.20, and the wet-day count climbs 0.2, 1.9, 6.0. The sea barely joins in at 66.8°F, 65.4°F, 67.3°F, and those marine readings come from a different source and a different decade than the IPMA air normals, so the two sets are not a matched pair.

Move four weeks earlier and you buy 5.1°F of extra heat and a near-rainless month, paid for in August company on the same sand. Move four weeks later and the water actually reads 1.9 degrees warmer, but October takes 10.7°F off the midday against August and brings six wet days. For a beach trip, October’s deciding number is 2.20 inches of rain, and August is where the pure swimming week lives.

Is September a good time to visit Faro?

Yes for most travelers, with one exception. If you want beach afternoons plus middays you can spend on your feet, and you can absorb two wet afternoons in two weeks, the month delivers: 79.5°F, 0.85 inches, 12h 27m of daylight. If the entire point is time in the water, 65.4°F is cooler than the Algarve’s reputation suggests, and it will shorten every swim you planned.

When the answer is no, shift earlier rather than later. August runs 84.6°F with rain on 0.2 days, and its sea reads 1.4 degrees above September’s, which is the swimming holiday in exchange for the crowds and the heat. October’s 67.3°F water is warmer still, but six wet days and 73.9°F middays make it a different trip: a walking and eating week with occasional beach time.

Of the three, only September puts a full morning inside the city walls and a full afternoon on a sand island on the same day, without October’s rain or August’s thermometer.

The last word

Build the two days around one boat and one walk, and let the weather fill the gaps. Then check the evenings before you choose between months: September’s average low is 64.9°F and October’s 60.4°F, and that 4.5-degree step is the difference between dinner on a terrace and dinner indoors with the door shut. Book the island crossing for late in the day while the light still holds to 19:40.

Sources & data for this guide

• September normals (high 79.5°F, low 64.9°F, 0.85 in, 1.9 days at 1 mm or more, 0.7 day at 10 mm or more) · IPMA, climate normals 1991-2020, station 554 Faro, altitude 5.0 m · checked Sep 23, 2026
• August and October normals, same station and same 1991-2020 period · IPMA · checked Sep 23, 2026
• Sea surface 65.4°F in September, 66.8°F in August, 67.3°F in October, all means of daily maxima over 2015-2024 · Open-Meteo Marine API · checked Sep 23, 2026
• Daylight 12h 27m, sunrise 06:13 UTC and sunset 18:40 UTC on Sep 15, converted to Europe/Lisbon · sunrise-sunset.org · checked Sep 23, 2026
• We found no occupancy or room-rate series for Faro and could not verify the municipal tourist tax rate, so no price ranking and no percentage appear above.
• Ferry fares, museum hours and church admissions are unverified · check operators and ticket desks on the day.

To plan your stay

• Best Time to Visit Faro: Weather, Sea Temperature and the Quiet Months
• Faro in August: Weather, Sea Temperature, Crowds and What to Do
• Faro in October: Weather, Sea Temperature and How It Compares to September
• Faro in July: Weather, Sea Temperature, Crowds and a Two-Day Plan

Nearby places

• Albufeira, Portugal: The Three Zones, the Beaches and the Old Town Hill
• Carvoeiro, Portugal: the Cove, Algar Seco and the Seven Hanging Valleys Trailhead
• Tavira, Portugal: the Island Ferry, the Old Town and Where to Stay