Weather in Paris in May

A good month. May is a solid month to be in Paris. Highs average 19.3 °C, lows 8.5 °C, and rain falls on 12 days — nothing in the month is working against you.

May ranks 5 of 12 in Paris: past the worst of the year but short of September, 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. 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 May reaches 30 °C. Across the twenty years measured, the hottest May day reached 30.4 °C and the coldest night fell to 0.5 °C, and the wettest single day dropped 45 mm — roughly 70% of the month's rain in one day.

May is moderately variable: 9 mm in the driest year against 164 mm in the wettest, around an average of 64 mm. Roughly two Mays in three land near that average, and the third does something else entirely.

Wind is light at 9.7 km/h, so the temperature on the page is close to the temperature on your skin, and humidity runs at 76%, high enough to notice on the warm days without dominating them.

How May sits in the year

The month is on the way up: 3 °C warmer than April, and June adds another 3.5 °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

15.2 hours of daylight, gaining 1.3 hours across the month. That is between Paris's extremes of 16.1 and 8.3 hours, so days are long enough not to constrain the plan.

An inland climate

Despite being inland, the year stays fairly even: 24.4 °C between the year's warmest afternoons and coldest nights.

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 Paris versus nearby

If Paris is one option among several, the nearby comparison is worth making. Le Havre is the weaker option in May — 3.9 °C cooler, the same number of rain days. Lille is close enough to be a coin toss — within a degree on temperature, 1 day less rain.

So: May works, with September the better month by 7 points if the dates can move. If they cannot, nothing here should stop you booking.

Every month in Paris

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