Weather in Le Havre in March

A hard month. March is a hard month in Le Havre, and worth planning around. Highs sit at 10.2 °C and the day is short; this is an indoors-with-excursions month, not an outdoors-all-day one.

March ranks 8 of 12 in Le Havre: past the worst of the year but short of July, which is the month to book if the dates are open.

Rain on 12 days, 1 of them heavy. Enough to need a plan B, not enough to need a plan around it. Layers, and a genuinely waterproof outer — at 10.2 °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: the day barely swings — 4.8 °C between the overnight low and the afternoon high. Across the twenty years measured, the hottest March day reached 17.4 °C and the coldest night fell to -2.7 °C.

March is moderately variable: 17 mm in the driest year against 142 mm in the wettest, around an average of 62 mm. Roughly two Marchs in three land near that average, and the third does something else entirely.

Wind sits around 17.2 km/h — a steady breeze rather than a nuisance, and welcome on the warmer days, and humidity runs at 85%, which at 10.2 °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: 2 °C warmer than February, and April adds another 2.7 °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

11.8 hours of daylight, gaining 1.8 hours across the month. That is between Le Havre's extremes of 16.3 and 8.2 hours, so days are long enough not to constrain the plan.

Sea temperature

The sea sits at about 8.6 °C in March — too cold to swim without a wetsuit. The sea peaks at 17.4 °C in September and bottoms out at 8.6 °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

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 Le Havre versus nearby

If Le Havre is one option among several, the nearby comparison is worth making. Paris is close enough to be a coin toss — 2 °C warmer, the same number of rain days. London is close enough to be a coin toss — within a degree on temperature, 1 day less rain.

So: March is a compromise. July is 33 points better and is what Le Havre 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 Le Havre

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