Best time to visit the USA

There is no single best time to visit the USA, because the same week brings different weather and access from one region to the next. In July Phoenix averages a high of 107°F and San Francisco 66°F. The high roads of the northern national parks open for a few months only, and the Atlantic hurricane season covers half the year. The right month depends on the region, so this guide sets the official figures side by side.

The guide gathers what our state, city and park guides say about seasons and adds the national picture. We read the figures below on 30 October 2026 on NOAA's 1991 to 2020 climate normals, the National Hurricane Center, the Storm Prediction Center, the National Interagency Fire Center, the Park Service's road pages and visitor counts, the Office of Personnel Management, the National Travel and Tourism Office and NIST.

Which months suit each US region, from Miami to Seattle?

Each US region has its own good months, and the official figures point to a different season for the desert, the coasts, the north and the high parks. The table reads the NOAA normals and the Park Service's road records for each region. The months in the last column follow from those figures, not from a ranking.

The site's park guides name their own good months, on their own terms. Zion National Park gives April, May and October for walking weather. Grand Teton National Park gives late June to mid-September. Great Smoky Mountains National Park gives mid-October to early November for autumn colour, and Death Valley National Park November to March. Our guides to the best time to visit Zion and the best time to visit Yellowstone go through those parks month by month.

How warm are ten US cities in January, April, July and October?

Ten US cities range from a 32°F January high at Chicago O'Hare to a 107°F July high at Phoenix Sky Harbor, on NOAA's 1991 to 2020 normals. The table gives the average high and low for one month in each season, with the station each figure comes from. The region is the Census region of the state.

Denver and Los Angeles appear here with their downtown stations, the same ones our Colorado and California guides print. The airports read differently. Los Angeles International averages a July high of 75°F against 82°F downtown. Denver International averages 45°F in January against 49°F downtown.

Heat is the hard limit in the desert. Phoenix averages 28.5 days at 100°F or more in July alone, and Las Vegas 25.8. Miami never reaches 100°F in a normal year, yet it has 91 days at 90°F or more, most of them in July and August.

Cold is the limit further north. Chicago O'Hare has 28 nights at or below freezing in a normal January, and downtown Denver has 150 such nights a year. Miami, Los Angeles and San Francisco have none.

San Francisco's calendar runs late. The city's warmest month is September, at 70°F, while July averages only 66°F. Downtown Los Angeles peaks in August, at 84°F.

Which US cities get their rain in winter, and which in summer?

The US cities in the table split into a summer-rain group in the south-east and a winter-rain group on the Pacific coast. Miami takes 67% of its 67.4 inches from June to October, with rain on about 19 days in August. San Francisco takes 84% of its rain from November to March, and downtown Los Angeles 82% from December to March.

Seattle's wet season is October to March, with 75% of the year's rain. July and August together bring only 1.57 inches, 4% of the total, and rain falls on about 5 days in each. In January Seattle sees rain on about 19 days.

New Orleans and New York have no dry season. New Orleans is wettest in June, at 7.62 inches, and New York's monthly normals stay between 3.19 and 4.60 inches all year. Snow is the other half of the northern winter. New York's Central Park averages 29.8 inches a season, and Chicago O'Hare 38.4, almost all of it from December to March.

Phoenix gets a third of its small annual rainfall, 33%, from July to September, the monsoon months. The two official calendars for the monsoon differ by two weeks. The National Weather Service dates Arizona's monsoon from 15 June to 30 September, as our Arizona guide notes. The Park Service at Zion says July to September.

When is hurricane season in the Atlantic, the eastern Pacific and Hawaii?

Hurricane season in the Atlantic runs from 1 June to 30 November, according to the National Hurricane Center. The basin covers the Atlantic Ocean, the Caribbean Sea and the Gulf. The season peaks on 10 September, and most activity falls between mid-August and mid-October.

An average Atlantic season forms its first named storm around 20 June and its first hurricane around 11 August. Its first major hurricane comes around 1 September. The centre adds that storms sometimes form before and after the official dates.

Our guides to Miami, New Orleans, Florida, Louisiana and Hawaii cover what the season means on the ground. A coastal trip from mid-August to mid-October falls in the busiest part of the Atlantic season.

When do tornadoes peak on the Plains and the Gulf Coast?

Tornado season on the southern Plains peaks from May into early June, according to the Storm Prediction Center. The Gulf Coast peaks earlier in the spring. The northern Plains and the upper Midwest peak in June or July.

NOAA's severe-storms laboratory uses the same wording and names the states. The southern Plains are Texas, Oklahoma and Kansas. The northern Plains and upper Midwest are North and South Dakota, Nebraska, Iowa and Minnesota. The Storm Prediction Center describes a general northward shift from late winter to midsummer, and warns that tornadoes can happen any time of year.

Our Oklahoma and Kansas guides cover tornado season in those two states.

What did the October 2026 fire outlook say about wildfire season?

The National Interagency Fire Center's outlook of 1 October 2026 counted 8,604,892 acres burned across the country by 30 September. That was 141% of the previous 10-year average, from 62,369 fires. The outlook expected activity in the Great Basin to fall to normal off-season levels from late October.

For northern California the same outlook said lower-elevation green-up should end the fire season during November and December. Alaska was already out of fire season as temperatures dropped below freezing. The next outlook is due on 2 November 2026. The centre's pages publish no national month-by-month fire calendar, so this guide gives none.

The parks give their own warnings. Lassen Volcanic National Park warns that wildfires often occur between July and October. At Crater Lake National Park fire season often runs into late September and October.

When are the high park roads open in Glacier, Yosemite and Rocky Mountain?

The high park roads in Glacier, Yosemite and Rocky Mountain National Parks are usually open from late May to July until October or November. The exact dates move by weeks from year to year. The Park Service publishes no 2027 dates for any of them, and on 30 October 2026 four of the five roads below were closed or closing.

Glacier's road shows how far the usual window can slip. In the eleven seasons from 2012 to 2022, Logan Pass opened as early as 16 June and as late as 13 July. In 2017 it closed on 3 September, and the latest closing was 16 October.

Yosemite's Tioga Road opened as late as 22 July in 2023, after a snowpack of 244%. The Park Service says predicting the opening is not possible, even in late spring. The road closed temporarily on 29 October 2026, with no reopening date, two weeks before its median closing of 14 November. While it is closed, Yosemite cannot be entered from the east.

Trail Ridge Road has two Park Service answers on the same day. On 30 October 2026 the park's alert said the road had closed at 5 p.m. on 23 October. The roads page, last updated on 6 October, still called it open to through travel. Neither page said the closure was for the season.

Denali's summer runs from mid-May to mid-September. The Park Service says full bus service along the park road will resume in 2027, and bus reservations open on 1 December 2026. In winter the road is plowed to Park Headquarters at Mile 3.

Yellowstone switches to oversnow travel in winter. Snowcoach and snowmobile travel on the entrance roads and most groomed roads runs from 15 December 2026 to 15 March 2027, weather permitting. The road from Mammoth to Norris closes to them earlier, on 7 March. The one road open to regular vehicles all year runs from the North Entrance at Gardiner to the Northeast Entrance at Cooke City.

How much of a national park's year falls in July?

A national park's year is far more concentrated in the north than in the south. Glacier took 24.4% of its 2025 visits in July and 0.48% in February. Denali took 95.3% of its year from May to September. The table gives the Park Service's 2025 counts for ten parks.

Glacier took 83.3% of its year from June to September and 5.0% from November to April. The Great Smoky Mountains are the one park in the table whose peak is October, with 1,561,683 visits, ahead of July. The Everglades run the other way from the north: December to April held 55.5% of the year, and June to October only 29.7%.

Eleven parks add a $100 fee per person aged 16 or older for non-residents. Acadia, Everglades, Glacier, Grand Canyon, Grand Teton, Rocky Mountain, Yellowstone, Yosemite and Zion are on that list, with Bryce Canyon and Sequoia and Kings Canyon. Our guide to national park fees for international visitors explains the fee and the $250 annual pass for non-residents.

Which 2027 US federal holidays make long weekends?

The 2027 US federal holidays make ten three-day weekends, counting the one at the turn of the year. The dates are those of the Office of Personnel Management. The weekends in the last column are our own calendar arithmetic.

New Year's Day 2028 falls on a Saturday, and OPM lists Friday 31 December 2027 as its holiday. That makes one more weekend, from 31 December to 2 January. OPM's list governs federal pay and leave, and it does not say that shops or schools close.

Holiday weekends are especially busy at Zion, in the Park Service's own words. Memorial Day weekend 2025 brought over 95,000 visits there. The same page calls December and January less busy, except around the holidays.

The Park Service's fee-free days for 2027 are not published yet. The last one on its 2026 list is Veterans Day, 11 November 2026, and since 2026 those days are for US citizens and residents only.

When do overseas visitors arrive in the USA, month by month?

Overseas visitors arrive in the USA most in August and least in February, in the National Travel and Tourism Office's counts. August held 10.2% of 2025's 34,289,238 overseas arrivals, and February 6.4%. The pattern was the same in 2019. The counts cover visitors staying at least one night under qualifying visa types.

Western Europe has a second peak in April, at 10.7% in 2025 and 10.3% in 2019. The United Kingdom's largest month was October in both years. The files give no reason for any of these shapes, so we do not offer one.

Total arrivals, counting Canada and Mexico, were 68,287,793 in 2025. That was 14.0% below the 79,441,595 of 2019. For the paperwork before a trip, see our guides to the ESTA and to US visas for tourists.

When do US clocks change in 2027, and where do they stay put?

US clocks go forward at 2 a.m. on Sunday 14 March 2027 and back at 2 a.m. on Sunday 7 November 2027. Federal regulation sets the rule, 49 CFR 71.2 as NIST publishes it: the second Sunday in March and the first Sunday in November. The 2027 dates are our arithmetic on that rule, and the 2026 period ended on Sunday 1 November 2026.

Arizona and Hawaii do not observe daylight saving time, and nor do American Samoa, Guam, Puerto Rico and the US Virgin Islands. The Navajo Nation in Arizona does observe it. In summer a drive from Page, Arizona onto Navajo land can therefore change the clock by an hour.

Our guides to phone and eSIM in the USA and to driving in the USA as a visitor cover the rest of the practical planning.