Weather in Cali in May

A hard month. May is a hard month in Cali, and worth planning around. You should expect rain on 18 days of the month, which is more days wet than dry.

May ranks 9 of 12 in Cali: past the worst of the year but short of August, which is the month to book if the dates are open.

Rain on 18 days, 3 of them heavy. Enough to need a plan B, not enough to need a plan around it. Natural fibres and a second shirt for the day. At 85% nothing dries, including you.

What the averages hide

Averages flatten a month, and this one hides a few things: 16 days top 30 °C — hot spells arrive, but they break. Across the twenty years measured, the hottest May day reached 33.9 °C and the coldest night fell to 17.5 °C, and the wettest single day dropped 31 mm — roughly 28% of the month's rain in one day.

May is moderately variable: 33 mm in the driest year against 235 mm in the wettest, around an average of 110 mm. Roughly two Mays in three land near that average, and the third does something else entirely.

Wind is light at 4.8 km/h, so the temperature on the page is close to the temperature on your skin, and humidity at 85% is the real story though — it is the number that decides how the day feels, not the 30 °C.

How May sits in the year

Temperatures hold steady either side: 30.1 °C in April, 30 here, 30.1 in June. Nothing about the timing within the month matters much. Rain is the thing that moves: June brings 6 days less of it, so pushing the dates later buys drier weather.

Daylight in May

Cali sits close enough to the equator that daylight barely moves all year — 12.3 hours in May, against a range of just 0.4 hours across the whole calendar. Sunrise and sunset land at roughly the same time whenever you come.

An inland climate

Despite being inland, the year stays fairly even: 10.8 °C between the year's warmest afternoons and coldest nights. At 758 m the air is thin enough to matter — sun that burns faster than the temperature suggests, and nights that cool off quickly.

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.

May in Cali versus nearby

If Cali is one option among several, the nearby comparison is worth making. Bogotá is a better bet in May — 11.5 °C cooler, 7 days more rain. Medellín is a better bet in May — 5.4 °C cooler, 8 days more rain.

So: May works, with August the better month by 18 points if the dates can move. If they cannot, nothing here should stop you booking.

Every month in Cali

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