Gaborone month by month — at a glance
Hover each month for the summary. Click to pin it.
01 A ratio of 188 to 1
Key moments at a glance
8.4 mm, 25.3 °C by day and 8.4 °C by night. Neither rain nor cold.
Guaranteed sky, but mean lows of 4.3 °C and a record of −5 °C.
11.4 mm and 30.1 °C, with nights back up to 12.3 °C. The last window.
Nine rain days and 32.6 °C. Heat and water at the same time.
The classification is hot semi-arid, BSh on the Köppen scale. The 1991–2020 normals measured at the international airport add up to 488.4 millimetres a year, spread over 50.4 rain days. Which is to say: in this city it rains, on average, one day in seven. The other six are sunny.
And that rain is concentrated. From October to April, 461.8 of the annual 488.4 millimetres fall: 95% of the year's water in seven months. From May to September only 26.6 millimetres remain in total, less than falls here in a single November.
02 The winter nobody expects
This is where most people planning this trip go wrong. You look up "southern Africa, dry climate" and assume warmth all year. But the city sits at about 1,010 metres, deep inland, and in winter the clear sky that stops the rain also stops the night heat from being held in.
The heat record is 43.3 degrees, measured in December. The cold record is 5.8 below zero, measured in June. Forty-nine degrees of range in one city.
The averages confirm it without drama: July's mean low is 4.3 degrees and June's is 5. There are on average fifty-one days a year below 7 degrees, and one below zero. This is not heavy-coat weather, but a jacket is compulsory from six in the evening between May and August — something almost nobody packs.
03 October depends on the year before
There is a nuance no table shows and worth knowing, because it bears on the worst possible decision. The natural assumption is that the hottest month is January, and in a drought year it is: if the rain fails, the heat peak lands in January or February.
But in a normal rainfall year the peak comes earlier, in October, right before the rain starts. The reason is simple: water cools, and until it arrives nothing checks the build-up. So October — which on the table looks like a mild transitional month at 41.3 millimetres — can in practice be the hardest month of the year, with mean highs of 32.2 degrees and ground that has not had a drop since April.
Translated into a decision: if your only option is the hot half of the year, November or March beats October. By November the rain has begun and the air has been washed; by March the season is ending and the landscape is at its best. October combines the worst of both: peak heat without the green.
04 What you see in each half
The dry half — May to September — delivers sky, visibility and distance. The scrub is stripped bare, you can see through it, and that is why this is the season when wildlife is easiest to pick out in the reserves around the city. The bed of the Notwane where it passes through town can be entirely dry: a tongue of sand between scrub, walkable on foot.
The wet half — October to April — delivers the opposite: dense green, towering afternoon storms, pools and tall grass. The animals disperse, because there is water everywhere and they stop gathering at the few places to drink. It is prettier and it is harder to see.
If you had to keep one answer, it is May. Eight millimetres of rain, highs of 25.3 degrees and lows of 8.4: the landscape keeps some of the previous season's green, the nights are cool but not cold, and there is not one climatic reason to be anywhere else. After May, August and September. And after that, anything rather than October.
