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Barranquilla, a major port city and Colombia's fourth-largest, sits on the Caribbean coast at the mouth of the Magdalena River in the north of the country at approximately 10.97°N, 74.80°W. It has a hot tropical climate (Köppen Aw/BSh) — hot and humid year-round, cooled by trade winds — with a long dry season and a pronounced wet season, and is famous for its Carnival, one of the largest in the world.
There is no summer in the temperate sense: temperatures stay hot and steady, with daytime highs around 31–33°C all year and warm nights, tempered by the Caribbean trade winds. The wet season, from May to November, is hotter-feeling and more humid, with heavy afternoon downpours and thunderstorms, peaking in September and October, when intense rains can flood the city's streets in sudden torrents.
There is no true winter, but the dry season from December to April is the most pleasant time, when strong trade winds sweep the coast, humidity eases, rain all but stops and skies are bright — the season of the famous Barranquilla Carnival in February. Temperatures remain hot and steady, but the breezy, dry conditions make it comfortably the best time of year.
Barranquilla receives on the order of 800–850 mm of rain a year, almost none of it from mid-December to April, while the wet season from May to November — with a strong peak in September and October — delivers the bulk, often as short, intense downpours that can briefly flood the streets. Live rainfall, humidity, and pressure readings for the city are shown in the panels above.
Barranquilla's weather is governed by the Caribbean trade winds, which keep the hot tropical air moving and make the long dry season — the time of its world-famous Carnival — breezy and comfortable. Its intense wet-season downpours are notorious for creating arroyos, sudden torrents that race through the streets after heavy rain; the city lies at the edge of the Atlantic hurricane belt, so direct strikes are rare but not impossible.
To follow any single measurement in Barranquilla more closely, use our live instruments: the online barometer for atmospheric pressure, the thermometer for temperature, the hygrometer for humidity, the anemometer for wind speed, the wind vane for wind direction, and the rain gauge for rainfall.