Weather in Anchorage in November

The month to avoid. November is the month most people should skip in Anchorage. Highs sit at -1.5 °C and the day is short; this is an indoors-with-excursions month, not an outdoors-all-day one.

November ranks 10 of 12 — near the bottom of Anchorage's year. July is the month that works, and the swing between the two is 54 points, which is a different holiday rather than a slightly better one.

This is persistent light rain rather than storms: 14 wet days but only 1 heavy ones. It rarely cancels anything outright, and it rarely fully clears either. A jacket beats an umbrella. Layers, and a genuinely waterproof outer — at -1.5 °C the difference between a good day and a miserable one is entirely down to what you are wearing.

What the averages hide

Averages flatten a month, and this one hides a few things: 24 nights drop below freezing, so anything left outside stays frozen; the day barely swings — 4 °C between the overnight low and the afternoon high. Across the twenty years measured, the hottest November day reached 8.3 °C and the coldest night fell to -19.1 °C, and the wettest single day dropped 33 mm — roughly 46% of the month's rain in one day.

November is moderately variable: 13 mm in the driest year against 150 mm in the wettest, around an average of 71 mm. Roughly two Novembers in three land near that average, and the third does something else entirely.

Wind is light at 7 km/h, so the temperature on the page is close to the temperature on your skin, and humidity runs at 92%, which at -1.5 °C means damp rather than muggy — the kind of cold that gets into a coat and stays there.

How November sits in the year

The month is on the way down: 7.5 °C cooler than October, with December dropping another 1.9 °C. The first week and the last are not the same trip.

Daylight in November

7.4 hours of daylight, losing 2.5 hours across the month. That is between Anchorage's extremes of 19.3 and 5.5 hours, so days are long enough not to constrain the plan.

An inland climate

With no coast nearby, the year swings a fair way — 27 °C between the warmest afternoons and the coldest nights, wider than any coastal city at this latitude would manage.

How busy it gets

Off season. The genuine off season: cheapest by a distance, with the caveat that some tours and restaurants close entirely.

Crowd levels are estimated from climate desirability and school-holiday calendars, not from visitor numbers.

November in Anchorage versus nearby

If Anchorage is one option among several, the nearby comparison is worth making. Prince George is close enough to be a coin toss — 2.1 °C warmer, 3 days more rain. Tofino is a better bet in November — 11.3 °C warmer, 7 days more rain.

So: November is a compromise. July is 48 points better and is what Anchorage is actually like at its best — worth moving the trip for if that is possible, and worth adjusting expectations for if it is not.

Every month in Anchorage

See all twelve months in Anchorage, or where else to go in November.