Weather in Kyoto in March

A hard month. March is a hard month in Kyoto, and worth planning around. Highs sit at 12.5 °C and the day is short; this is an indoors-with-excursions month, not an outdoors-all-day one.

March ranks 7 of 12 in Kyoto: past the worst of the year but short of May, which is the month to book if the dates are open.

Rain on 14 days, 4 of them heavy. Enough to need a plan B, not enough to need a plan around it. Layers, and a genuinely waterproof outer — at 12.5 °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: 5 nights fall below freezing. Across the twenty years measured, the hottest March day reached 21 °C and the coldest night fell to -2.8 °C, and the wettest single day dropped 37 mm — roughly 32% of the month's rain in one day.

March is statistically steady but not small: the year-to-year variation is modest in relative terms, yet the wettest March on record still delivered 183 mm against 67 mm in the driest. In a month this wet, even a tame spread is a lot of rain in absolute terms — the 114 mm average is a reasonable planning figure, not a promise.

Wind is light at 10.7 km/h, so the temperature on the page is close to the temperature on your skin, and humidity runs at 81%, which at 12.5 °C means damp rather than muggy — the kind of cold that gets into a coat and stays there.

How March sits in the year

The month is on the way up: 3.8 °C warmer than February, and April adds another 5.6 °C. Late in the month feels noticeably different from the start of it, which is worth knowing if the trip is short.

Daylight in March

11.9 hours of daylight, gaining 1.1 hours across the month. That is between Kyoto's extremes of 14.5 and 9.8 hours, so days are long enough not to constrain the plan.

An inland climate

With no coast nearby, the year swings a fair way — 30.3 °C between the warmest afternoons and the coldest nights, wider than any coastal city at this latitude would manage.

How busy it gets

Quiet. Few other visitors, cheaper rooms, and a real chance some seasonal operators are shut.

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

March in Kyoto versus nearby

If Kyoto is one option among several, the nearby comparison is worth making. Osaka is a better bet in March — within a degree on temperature, 3 days less rain. Hamamatsu is a better bet in March — within a degree on temperature, 4 days less rain.

So: March is a compromise. May is 27 points better and is what Kyoto 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 Kyoto

See all twelve months in Kyoto, or where else to go in March.