Guimarães in December: Weather, Rain Days and Short Daylight

GUIMARÃES · DECEMBER · THE MONTH GUIDE

December hands Guimarães back to its own size. The town where Portugal began, founded in the 10th century and the country’s capital in the 12th, measures 38.2 hectares inside its protected historic perimeter, with a buffer zone of 129.4 hectares around it. In December that walkable core comes with a 58.5°F afternoon, 12.4 days of measurable rain, and the sun gone at 5:08 p.m. on the 15th.

It is an easy trip to slot in. Most American travelers reach the north of Portugal through Porto, and Guimarães works either as two nights of its own or as a long day out of a Porto base. Our flights guide handles the inbound side and getting around handles the rest. What the date changes is the schedule, not the sights.

On this page

• December weather in Guimarães58.5°F highs, 6.04 inches and 12.4 rain days
• How cold the nights getA 45.7°F normal low, and the frost question
• Crowds and what a December trip costsWhat we could price, and what we could not
• Things to do in Guimarães in DecemberThe castle, the monastic pole and the Couros Zone
• A two-day plan, hour by hourTwo days built around a 5:08 p.m. sunset
• December, November or JanuaryHow the three months compare, degree by degree
• Is December a good month to come?Our verdict, and who should shift dates

One thing to settle before the numbers start. Guimarães has no weather station of its own in the national normals, so the figures here are read at Porto’s airport on the coast and carried inland with a warning attached. That warning matters more in December than in June, and we spell it out below.

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

Every figure here comes from one real thermometer. IPMA, the Portuguese national weather service, publishes 1991-2020 normals for station 545 at Porto Pedras Rubras, 67.7 meters above sea level: a December high of 58.5°F, a low of 45.7°F and 6.04 inches of precipitation. That is a station record, not a model grid cell, and it stands on the coast at Porto’s airport. Guimarães sits inland, which the same source says means colder winter nights than the reading above and hotter summer afternoons.

Rain reaches 0.04 inch on 12.4 December days, two days in five. On 5.3 of them it passes 0.39 inch, a proper soaking about one day in six. Those thresholds are IPMA’s own and they are not the 0.10-inch counts American tables use, so the two sets of rain days do not line up. Translated into a week on the ground: roughly three wet days, one of which rearranges an afternoon, and four that stay usable.

Day and night sit 12.8°F apart, which is a narrow spread by winter standards and simple to dress for. One warm mid-layer, one waterproof shell, and shoes with grip: 5.3 heavy-rain days leave the old town wet underfoot for long stretches. Nothing in these normals calls for a parka. Our packing guide covers the rest of the suitcase.

Light is the real constraint. On December 15 the sun rises at 7:51 a.m. and sets at 5:08 p.m. in local time, giving 9 hours 16 minutes. An itinerary that saves the walled town for late afternoon loses it. Put the outdoor half of each day before 3 p.m. and let dinner take the dark end.

How warm is Guimarães in December?

Mild is the accurate word. The normal afternoon reaches 58.5°F and the normal night falls to 45.7°F, 12.8 degrees apart, and neither end of that range asks for serious winter equipment. Read 45.7°F as the gentle version of a Guimarães night, though: the station that produced it sits on the coast, and IPMA’s own note says the inland town runs colder after dark.

In practice you dress twice a day. A 46-degree morning wants a sweater under the rain shell while the granite is still cold. By two in the afternoon, with the sun out and the reading near 58°F, the shell comes off and gets carried. Bring a bag that can hold it, because you will be on foot for most of the daylight there is.

We found no count of nights at or below freezing for Guimarães, so we give none. An average low hides its coldest nights, and this one is measured in the wrong place to settle the question. No sea temperature belongs here either: a coastal page would quote one as an average of daily maxima, which runs warmer than a 24-hour mean, but Guimarães is inland. The Atlantic is a drive west, and our Porto guide handles that side of the map.

How busy is Guimarães in December? Crowds, prices and the demand peak

We could not verify an occupancy series or a monthly room-rate series for Guimarães, so we crown no month cheap and no month expensive. What we can state is a calendar fact: December carries the year-end holidays, and that is the one demand signal we will name. UNESCO’s file adds the only sourced comment on visitor pressure we have, naming gentrification driven by tourism as a pressure that may undermine the property over time.

Our booking advice is editorial, not measured. Lock the holiday-week nights well ahead, since the town is small and the stock inside the protected perimeter is smaller. Midweek dates in the first half of December are the ones we would move dates around, and they are also the ones that leave the streets to residents. Where to stay in Portugal sets out the regional options.

On the lodging tax, we could not verify a rate for Guimarães, so no percentage and no per-night amount appears from us. If your hotel applies one it will land on the final bill rather than the booking screen, and our cost guide explains how that line usually behaves in Portugal.

The one place where paying more genuinely changes a December trip is location. The protected core measures 38.2 hectares, which is nothing to cross on foot, and a bed inside it means that a 0.39-inch afternoon costs you a coffee stop instead of a transfer. With 9 hours 16 minutes of daylight to spend, that is the upgrade that buys time back.

Things to do in Guimarães in December

December gives you temperature for walking. A 58.5°F afternoon is comfortable over several hours in a town whose entire interest is 38.2 hectares wide, and IPMA’s note on the inland position says the same site runs hotter than the coast on summer afternoons. Between the two, the winter month is the one that lets you do the whole perimeter without planning an escape from the sun.

The shape to walk is old and legible. Inside the walls, two poles standing from between 950 and 1498 anchor the town: the castle at the north end, the monastic complex at the south. Growth then happened outside the walls around the Franciscan and Dominican complexes. Nineteen properties in the perimeter are legally protected, ten as National Monuments and nine as properties of public interest. We could not verify an opening hour or an admission fee for any of them, so we quote none: check each operator before you go.

What the season changes is the air and the light, not the stone. The Couros Zone outside the walls, named for the leather tanning once done there and for the river, is open urban fabric: tanneries, workers’ housing and public spaces from the 19th and early 20th centuries, all of it experienced outdoors. On one December day in six the rain passes 0.39 inch, and that is the day to trade Couros for an interior. UNESCO singles the zone out as needing an urgent conservation strategy, so walk it with that in mind.

Plenty of it costs nothing. Most of the building stock is privately owned, but the public spaces belong to the municipality, and the squares laid out between 1498 and 1693 are free to walk in any weather. The medieval street plan survived that whole rebuilding campaign, which makes the layout itself the exhibit: granite ground floors carrying half-timbered upper stories, the technique this town exported to the Portuguese colonies.

Guimarães in December: a two-day itinerary

Day one runs north to south with the light. Be out by 8:30, an hour before the coldest edge has gone off the morning, and take the castle end first while the streets are empty. Mid-morning, work down through the walled town toward the monastic pole. Eat indoors between 1 and 2:30, when a wet day usually decides what it is doing. Spend the last usable hours in the squares, and be finished outdoors by 5:08 p.m.

Day two belongs to the Couros Zone and the streets outside the walls, ideally in the morning half of the 9 hours 16 minutes available. If the forecast promises one of the 5.3 heavy days, flip the order: interiors first, then a short outdoor loop in any break. If the rain settles in for good, December is a reasonable day to take the train out to Braga or back to Porto and treat Guimarães as one strong day rather than two damp ones.

Guimarães in December vs November and January

The three months are one slow slide. November’s afternoons average 62.2°F, December’s 58.5°F and January’s 57.2°F, so the big step down happens before December, not after it. Nights fall further and faster: 48.9°F, then 45.7°F, then 43.5°F. Rain totals move the other way, from 6.53 inches in November to 6.04 in December and 5.94 in January, with wet-day counts of 13.0, 12.4 and 12.8. No sea temperature enters the comparison, because all three months describe an inland town.

Shift four weeks back and you buy 3.7°F of afternoon and a slightly longer day, and you pay 0.49 inch of extra rain across 13.0 wet days. Shift four weeks forward to January and you lose 1.3°F by day and 2.2°F by night for the driest total of the three, which is a thin prize. November is the better swap if warmth is the point.

Is December a good time to visit Guimarães?

Yes, if your trip is a walking trip. A town of 38.2 protected hectares, ten National Monuments and a street plan that has survived since the Middle Ages is well matched to a 58.5°F afternoon and a jacket. No, if you need reliable dry hours or long light: 12.4 wet days and a 5:08 p.m. sunset are not negotiable, and a two-week itinerary built on outdoor days will feel cramped.

If that is a no, take November rather than January. It returns 3.7°F of afternoon and 3.2°F of night for 0.49 inch more rain, which is the better trade of the two directions. For a dry-weather trip you are looking at a different season altogether, and our 12-month verdict for Portugal makes that case with the numbers.

One thing December alone does here: of the three winter months, it is the only one that pairs a precipitation total under 6.1 inches with an afternoon still above 58°F.

The last word

The decision is where you sleep, not whether you come. Inside the walls, a wet December day costs you twenty minutes and a coffee. Outside them, it costs you the afternoon. One more thing worth knowing about the place you are walking through: the rules holding this town upright date from a master plan written in 1994 and revised in 2015, and the inscription itself took significant boundary changes in 2023. Book the bed in the core, pack the shell, and be on the castle side of town before four.

Sources & data for this guide

• December normals: high 58.5°F, low 45.7°F, 6.04 in · IPMA, climatological normals 1991-2020, station 545 Porto Pedras Rubras, altitude 67.7 m · checked Sep 24, 2026
• Rain days: 12.4 at 0.04 in or more, 5.3 at 0.39 in or more · same IPMA normals; these are the national service’s thresholds, not the 0.10-inch counts used in US tables · checked Sep 24, 2026
• Station caveat: the thermometer stands at Porto’s coastal airport, while Guimarães is inland with colder winter nights · IPMA · checked Sep 24, 2026
• November and January normals used in the comparison · IPMA 1991-2020, same station · checked Sep 24, 2026
• Daylight on December 15, sunrise 07:51 UTC and sunset 17:08 UTC, converted to local time · sunrise-sunset.org · checked Sep 24, 2026
• Inscription in 2001 under criteria (ii), (iii) and (iv), boundary changes in 2023, 38.2 ha property and 129.4 ha buffer, two intra-muros poles from 950-1498, nineteen protected properties, Couros Zone and its conservation warning, 1994 master plan revised 2015 · UNESCO World Heritage list, file 1031bis · checked Sep 24, 2026
• We found no opening hour and no admission fee for the castle, the palace or any Guimarães monument, and no occupancy or room-rate series for the town, so we quote no price and crown no month cheap or expensive · reading note, Sep 23, 2026
• Itinerary shape and booking advice are editorial; hours and fares change · check operators when you book.

To plan your stay

• Best Time to Visit Guimarães: Month-by-Month Highs, Rainfall and the Quiet Season
• Guimaraes in January: Weather, Rain Days and a Two-Day Plan
• Guimarães in November: Weather, Rain Days and a Two-Day Plan
• Guimaraes in February: Weather, Rain Days and How It Compares to January and March

Nearby places

• Braga, Portugal: the Bom Jesus Stairway, the Cathedral and Where to Stay
• Cascais, Portugal: the Town Beaches, Guincho and Where to Stay
• Ericeira, Portugal: the Surf Reserve, the Beaches by Level and Where to Stay