St. Thomas weather by month

The best time to visit St. Thomas is February or March, the two driest months on the Cyril E. King airport record, with 84 degree afternoons and no storm within 100 km of Charlotte Amalie in 34 seasons. What that certainty costs is the year's highest rates and its fullest cruise calendar. Below, every month on the record.

How St. Thomas's year works

St. Thomas is the island in this group with the weather station on it. NOAA's 1991 to 2020 normals for Cyril E. King airport, on the south shore west of Charlotte Amalie, are the numbers in the table above and in every month below: highs of 84 degrees in January and 90 in July, nights from 74 to 80, and a rain column that runs from 1.9 inches in February to 6.1 in November. Temperature barely moves across the year. Rain and the storm record are the year.

The second calendar is the sea's. The National Weather Service in San Juan divides the year into a winter swell season, November to April, and a summer one, and its winter surf advisories are written for the north-facing shores of Puerto Rico and the US Virgin Islands. Magens Bay faces north. It is the St. Thomas beach that takes a long-period swell when one arrives, not the one that hides from it, and the advisories do not name the south shore or the East End.

The third calendar is the ships', and it runs against the weather. The Virgin Islands Port Authority's schedule for its Crown Bay pier alone lists 49 calls in December 2025 and 7 in August 2026, before the West Indian Company dock at Havensight is counted. A dry February afternoon at Magens Bay is shared with whatever is in port. A wet October one is not.

St. Thomas in December: the holiday fortnight

December is a good month on the record and a full one on the calendar. The airport's rain drops to 2.9 inches over eight wet days after November's 6.1, highs settle at 85, the water holds at 82 and the winter trades are back. One tropical system has crossed within 100 km in December in 34 seasons, and it was not a hurricane.

The ships are the other half of the month. Crown Bay's 49 calls in December 2025 were the most of any month on the Port Authority's schedule, tied with January, and the fortnight from the middle of the month to just after New Year is the one that books first. Suits a family tied to the school holidays who books early; the first two weeks have the same sky with fewer people under it.

St. Thomas in January

January is the coolest month St. Thomas has, and the coolest is a high of 84 with nights of 74. Rain is 2.6 inches on six wet days and the water is 81. No tropical system has come within 100 km in January on the record.

This is the heart of the swell season on the north coast. A northerly swell can put surf on Magens Bay for a day or two while the south shore reads calm, so January is the month to have a car and a second beach in mind, and to ask the owner which way the house faces. Suits anyone who wants the winter at its most reliable and will pay the high-season rate for it.

St. Thomas in February

February is the month to book first: 1.9 inches of rain on five wet days, the driest reading at the airport, and highs of 84. The sea is at its coolest, 80 degrees, and that is the coolest it gets all year. No storm in the record.

Crown Bay listed 40 calls in February 2026, so the beaches nearest the piers share their weekdays with the ships. The East End and the north coast past Magens Bay are a drive the day visitors mostly do not make. Suits a couple or a group who want the fewest variables and will book months out.

St. Thomas in March

March is February with the sea a degree warmer. Rain stays at 1.9 inches, now on four wet days, the fewest of the year; highs reach 85 and the water 81. The East End gauge reads 1.3 inches, the driest reading on the island in any month.

The swell season is not over: the one 13 foot swell the San Juan forecast office recorded in the quiet 2013 to 2014 winter came in the last week of March. No tropical system in 34 seasons. Suits the same booking as February, made earlier, and anyone who wants the north coast surf-free should ask for the East End.

St. Thomas in April: Carnival

April is the last of the dry season and the first month of the lower rates. The airport reads 86 degrees, 2.2 inches on five wet days, the water 82 and nothing in the storm record.

Carnival is the month's event. It falls in late April into the first days of May, April 26 to May 2 in 2026 per the US Virgin Islands Department of Tourism, and ends with the parade through Charlotte Amalie; the 2027 dates had not been announced as of October 2026. Suits anyone who wants Carnival, and anyone who wants the dry season a week after the rates fall, and those two should not book the same week by accident.

St. Thomas in May

May is for the reader who wants the dry season's sky without its calendar. Highs of 87, nights of 78, three inches of rain on six wet days, most of it afternoon showers, and the water at 83. Hurricane season has not opened and no system has come within 100 km in May on the record.

Crown Bay's schedule drops from 24 calls in April 2026 to 9 in May, and the beaches nearest the piers get their weekdays back. Suits a couple without school dates, and anyone who found February booked.

St. Thomas in June

June opens hurricane season on the first of the month and shows no sign of it on St. Thomas: 2.4 inches on five wet days, drier than May, highs of 89 and the water at 84. No tropical system has passed within 100 km of Charlotte Amalie in June in 34 seasons. The National Hurricane Center's climatology puts the first named storm of an average season in mid to late June and the first hurricane in early to mid August, which is where the record agrees.

The heat is the tradeoff. The winter trades have gone and the afternoons sit still until July brings the wind back. Suits a group that wants the island quiet and priced for it, in a house that faces east.

St. Thomas in July

July is the hottest month with August, 90 degrees, and the one where the trade winds return and make that bearable. Rain is 2.9 inches on seven wet days at the airport and 3.9 at the East End gauge; the water is 85.

The storm record holds one system within 100 km in July in 34 seasons, Hurricane Bertha on July 8, 1996, which passed 29 km from Charlotte Amalie. That is the whole of July's record. Suits a family on summer holidays who will buy travel insurance at the deposit and not think about it again.

St. Thomas in August

August is where the storm record starts counting: five systems within 100 km in 34 seasons, two of them hurricanes, Debby on August 22, 2000 at 59 km and Dorian on August 28, 2019 at 19 km, the closest pass in the table. Rain rises to 4.4 inches on seven wet days, highs stay at 90 and the water reaches 85.

Crown Bay lists 7 calls in August 2026, the fewest of the Port Authority's year, so the beaches nearest the piers are at their emptiest. Suits a reader who wants the island nearly to themselves and accepts that a hurricane has come this close in August in two of the last 34 seasons.

St. Thomas in September: the peak of the season

September is the month to avoid if a storm would ruin the trip, and the cheapest if it would not. The National Hurricane Center puts the Atlantic peak on September 10, and the island's record agrees: six systems within 100 km in 34 seasons and four hurricanes, Marilyn in 1995, Georges in 1998, then Irma and Maria fourteen days apart in 2017, Irma passing 38 km from Charlotte Amalie at Category 5.

The ordinary September day is 89 degrees with the year's warmest sea, 86, and 5.9 inches of rain on nine wet days, which leaves 21 dry ones. Suits nobody who cannot move their dates. For those who can, insurance bought before a storm has a name is the whole plan, and the hurricane season page has the policy wording to look for.

St. Thomas in October

October keeps September's rain and loses its hurricanes. Four systems have passed within 100 km in October in 34 seasons and none at hurricane strength; the rain is 5.3 inches on ten wet days, the wettest count of the year with November. Highs ease to 88 and the water stays at 86.

The ships begin to come back, 11 calls at Crown Bay in October 2025 against 7 in August. Suits a reader who priced September and wanted the same quiet with a shorter storm record behind it.

St. Thomas in November: Thanksgiving

November is the wettest month at the airport, 6.1 inches over ten wet days, and the last month of hurricane season on the calendar only: no tropical system has come within 100 km of Charlotte Amalie in November in 34 seasons. Highs are 87 and the water 84.

The winter arrives from two directions at once. The swell season opens on the north coast, and Crown Bay's schedule climbs to 29 calls in November 2025, 19 of them after the fifteenth. Suits a reader who wants Thanksgiving on the island and accepts a shower a day for it.

What a wet day on St. Thomas looks like

A wet day in the table is any day the airport gauge records a tenth of an inch, and November's ten wet days leave twenty dry ones. The showers cross the island's spine in a quarter of an hour and are gone, most often in the afternoon or before dawn; a day lost from morning to night happens inside a tropical system and almost never outside one.

Where you stay changes the number a little. The East End gauge is drier than the airport from February to April, 1.3 inches against 1.9 in March, and wetter in July. On the north coast the weather that matters is the swell, not the rain.

How to choose a month on St. Thomas

Four questions settle it.

Would a storm ruin the trip, or only cost an insurance claim? If it would ruin it, stay inside December to June, where the record holds one system in 34 seasons and no hurricane. If a policy covers it, August to October is the cheapest sky on the island.

Do you mind sharing the beach with a ship? Crown Bay's calendar runs from 49 calls in December to 7 in August, and that is one of the two piers. February is the fullest Magens Bay of the year; September is the emptiest.

Do you want the water warm or the air cool? The sea runs from 80 degrees in February to 86 in September; the air moves six degrees across the whole year, so the sea is the real choice.

Is Carnival a reason to come or to stay away? It ran April 26 to May 2 in 2026; book the week before or the week after if it is the second.

Whichever you choose, the reading at the top of this page is this afternoon over the airport, and the table is the record behind it.

Every system at hurricane strength whose track came within 100 km of the island since 1989, from the National Hurricane Center’s best-track record. The distance is the closest point of the track; the wind is the sustained wind at that point.