Kochi (Cochin), a major port on the Malabar Coast of Kerala, sits on a cluster of islands and backwaters facing the Arabian Sea in southwestern India, backed by the Western Ghats, at approximately 9.93°N, 76.27°E. It has a tropical monsoon climate (Köppen Am) — hot, humid and very rainy — with remarkably steady temperatures and a long, drenching monsoon season.

There is little seasonal change in temperature: it stays hot and humid year-round, with daytime highs around 31–33°C, peaking around March and April before the rains. The southwest monsoon then bursts over Kerala around the start of June — the first place in India it reaches — bringing torrential, near-continuous rain through August, with thick cloud, oppressive humidity and widespread flooding in bad years.

There is no true winter, but the drier, cooler stretch from December to February brings warm days around 31°C, comfortable nights near 23–24°C, lower humidity and much less rain. This bright, warm, drier season is comfortably the best time to visit the backwaters and beaches, though a second, weaker rainy spell arrives with the northeast monsoon in October and November.

Kochi is very wet, receiving on the order of 3,000–3,200 mm of rain a year, the great majority from the southwest monsoon between June and September, with a secondary northeast-monsoon peak in October and November; the Western Ghats, rising just inland, force the moist sea air upward and wring out enormous totals. Live rainfall, humidity, and pressure readings for the city are shown in the panels above.

Kochi is where India's monsoon begins: the southwest monsoon makes landfall on the Kerala coast around 1 June each year, an event tracked nationally, before sweeping north across the subcontinent. The Western Ghats behind the city lift the moist Arabian Sea air to produce some of the heaviest rainfall in India, and the catastrophic Kerala floods of 2018 showed how devastating an exceptional monsoon can be.

To follow any single measurement in Kochi 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.