Weather in Coffs Harbour in August

Prime time. August is about as good as Coffs Harbour gets. Highs average 19.4 °C, lows 13.9 °C, and rain falls on 6 days — nothing in the month is working against you.

August is the highest-scoring month of the twelve. The nearest rival is September, and the month at the other end of the year is March.

Rain falls on only 6 days, so an itinerary with no wet-weather fallback is a reasonable risk. Nothing specialised needed — this is the month you pack for the trip rather than for the weather.

What the averages hide

Averages flatten a month, and this one hides a few things: it never really gets hot: not one day in an average August reaches 30 °C; the day barely swings — 5.5 °C between the overnight low and the afternoon high. Across the twenty years measured, the hottest August day reached 25.8 °C and the coldest night fell to 9.1 °C, and the wettest single day dropped 128 mm — roughly 217% of the month's rain in one day.

This is the volatile part. August rainfall has ranged from 2 mm to 230 mm across the twenty years measured — a 228 mm spread around an average of 59 mm. The average is real but almost no individual August looks like it, so treat the figure as the middle of a wide range rather than a forecast.

Wind is light at 11.6 km/h, so the temperature on the page is close to the temperature on your skin, and humidity is unremarkable at 69%.

How August sits in the year

Temperatures hold steady either side: 18.5 °C in July, 19.4 here, 21.7 in September. Nothing about the timing within the month matters much.

Daylight in August

11 hours of daylight, gaining 0.8 hours across the month. That is between Coffs Harbour's extremes of 14.1 and 10.2 hours, so days are long enough not to constrain the plan.

Sea temperature

The sea sits at about 20.5 °C in August — swimmable, but it takes a moment to commit. The sea peaks at 25.8 °C in February and bottoms out at 20.5 °C — water lags the air by a month or two, which is why the best swimming often comes after the best weather.

How busy it gets

Peak season. Expect the highest prices of the year and to be booking well ahead. If the dates are flexible, October is the trade worth considering — 10 points weaker on weather, and materially quieter.

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

August in Coffs Harbour versus nearby

If Coffs Harbour is one option among several, the nearby comparison is worth making. Armidale is the weaker option in August — 5.4 °C cooler, the same number of rain days. Byron Bay is close enough to be a coin toss — within a degree on temperature, the same number of rain days.

So: August is the answer for Coffs Harbour. If it is booked out or priced out, September is the next best thing at 0 points behind, and March is the month to keep off the shortlist.

Every month in Coffs Harbour

See all twelve months in Coffs Harbour, or where else to go in August.