Weather in Bakersfield in May

Prime time. May is about as good as Bakersfield gets. Highs average 30.4 °C, lows 14.2 °C, and rain falls on 2 days — nothing in the month is working against you.

May ranks 8 of 12 in Bakersfield: past the worst of the year but short of November, which is the month to book if the dates are open.

Rain falls on only 2 days, so an itinerary with no wet-weather fallback is a reasonable risk. Pack for 30.4 °C days and 14.2 °C nights; the spread matters more here than any single number.

What the averages hide

Averages flatten a month, and this one hides a few things: 7 days clear 35 °C, so a serious heatwave is normal rather than notable; the day swings 16.2 °C from low to high, which means one bag has to cover both. Across the twenty years measured, the hottest May day reached 46.1 °C and the coldest night fell to 6.1 °C.

This is the volatile part. May rainfall has ranged from 0 mm to 42 mm across the twenty years measured — a 42 mm spread around an average of 8 mm. The average is real but almost no individual May looks like it, so treat the figure as the middle of a wide range rather than a forecast.

Wind is light at 7.7 km/h, so the temperature on the page is close to the temperature on your skin, and humidity is unremarkable at 47%.

How May sits in the year

The month is on the way up: 5 °C warmer than April, and June adds another 5.8 °C. Late in the month feels noticeably different from the start of it, which is worth knowing if the trip is short.

Daylight in May

May is at or near the longest days of Bakersfield's year: 14 hours of daylight, gaining 0.8 hours across the month. Evenings are the real gain — dinner outdoors still happens in full light.

An inland climate

With no coast nearby, the year swings a fair way — 32.5 °C between the warmest afternoons and the coldest nights, wider than any coastal city at this latitude would manage. Within May itself the daily swing is 16.2 °C, so mornings and afternoons need different clothes.

How busy it gets

Busy. Popular without being frantic; book the things you care about, improvise the rest.

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

May in Bakersfield versus nearby

If Bakersfield is one option among several, the nearby comparison is worth making. Los Angeles is a better bet in May — 4.5 °C cooler, the same number of rain days. Fresno is close enough to be a coin toss — within a degree on temperature, the same number of rain days.

So: May works, with November the better month by 13 points if the dates can move. If they cannot, nothing here should stop you booking.

Every month in Bakersfield

See all twelve months in Bakersfield, or where else to go in May.