Those swirling lines and triangular symbols on a weather map are a language. Once you can read it, a single chart tells …
Sharing your station’s data to networks like Weather Underground and the Ambient network is free, easy, and turns your h…
Measuring air temperature accurately is far harder than it looks, and most home stations get it wrong for one avoidable …
Fog is simply a cloud at ground level, but the different ways it forms explain why some mornings are socked in and other…
A heat dome can lock a region into days of dangerous, record-breaking heat. The mechanism behind it is a particular trap…
La Niña reshuffles weather patterns across the globe in broadly predictable ways. Here’s what the pattern is, and the ki…
Bangkok, the capital of Thailand, sits on the low, flat delta of the Chao Phraya River near the Gulf of Thailand, only a couple of metres above sea level, at approximately 13.76°N, 100.50°E. It has a tropical monsoon climate (Köppen Aw/Am) — hot and humid all year — with three seasons: a hot season, a rainy monsoon season, and a cooler dry season, and it ranks among the hottest major cities on Earth.
The hot season, from March to May, is intense, with April the hottest month — highs around 35–36°C and a 'feels-like' temperature pushed well past 40°C by high humidity, made worse by the city's urban heat island. The southwest monsoon then brings the rainy season from around May to October, when temperatures ease slightly but heavy afternoon and evening downpours and thunderstorms are frequent; September and October are the wettest, and the low-lying city is highly prone to flooding.
There is no true winter, but the cool, dry season from November to February is the most pleasant time, with warm days around 31–32°C, lower humidity, clear skies and comfortable nights that can dip to around 20–22°C — as cool as Bangkok gets. This dry, sunny stretch is comfortably the best time to visit, before the heat builds again toward March.
Bangkok is wet, receiving on the order of 1,500–1,700 mm of rain a year, overwhelmingly concentrated in the southwest-monsoon months from May to October, with a pronounced peak in September and October when monthly totals can top 300 mm; the November-to-February dry season sees very little. Live rainfall, humidity, and pressure readings for the city are shown in the panels above.
Flooding is the defining hazard of Bangkok's climate: built on a low, subsiding delta barely above sea level, the city is acutely vulnerable to monsoon rains, high tides and river flooding, as in the catastrophic floods of 2011. Lying north of the main typhoon belt, it is usually spared direct hits, but the remnants of tropical storms can enhance the monsoon rains, and the relentless heat and humidity of the hot season are a constant feature of life.
To follow any single measurement in Bangkok 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.