Weather in Rio de Janeiro in April

A good month. April is a solid month to be in Rio de Janeiro. The heat itself is manageable at 27.5 °C, but 82% humidity is what you will actually feel.

April ranks 7 of 12 in Rio de Janeiro: past the worst of the year but short of July, which is the month to book if the dates are open.

Rain on 14 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 82% nothing dries, including you.

What the averages hide

Averages flatten a month, and this one hides a few things: 4 days top 30 °C — hot spells arrive, but they break; the day barely swings — 4.6 °C between the overnight low and the afternoon high. Across the twenty years measured, the hottest April day reached 33.7 °C and the coldest night fell to 18.3 °C, and the wettest single day dropped 91 mm — roughly 90% of the month's rain in one day.

April is moderately variable: 32 mm in the driest year against 223 mm in the wettest, around an average of 101 mm. Roughly two Aprils in three land near that average, and the third does something else entirely.

Wind is light at 9.3 km/h, so the temperature on the page is close to the temperature on your skin, and humidity runs at 82%, high enough to notice on the warm days without dominating them.

How April sits in the year

Temperatures hold steady either side: 28.5 °C in March, 27.5 here, 25.6 in May. Nothing about the timing within the month matters much. Rain has already shifted: 5 days fewer than March had.

Daylight in April

11.6 hours of daylight, losing 0.6 hours across the month. That is between Rio de Janeiro's extremes of 13.5 and 10.7 hours, so days are long enough not to constrain the plan.

Sea temperature

The sea sits at about 26.4 °C in April — warm enough to stay in as long as you like. This is the warmest the water gets all year.

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.

April in Rio de Janeiro versus nearby

If Rio de Janeiro is one option among several, the nearby comparison is worth making. Belo Horizonte is a better bet in April — within a degree on temperature, 4 days less rain. São Paulo is close enough to be a coin toss — 2.1 °C cooler, 1 day less rain.

So: April is a compromise. July is 20 points better and is what Rio de Janeiro 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 Rio de Janeiro

See all twelve months in Rio de Janeiro, or where else to go in April.