Kigali month by month — at a glance
Hover each month for the summary. Click to pin it.
01 One and nine tenths of a degree
Key moments at a glance
10.2 mm over 0.9 rain days, with humidity at 54.7 %.
28.2 °C mean high… which is two degrees more than in May.
135.5 mm over 14.4 days and 228 hours of sun, the year's minimum.
121.2 mm over 13.6 days: it rains on practically every other day.
It is worth pausing on what that means for packing. In Kigali there is no winter clothing and no summer clothing: there is clothing. What you take in January serves exactly the same in August, and the only real thermal decision is the night one, because the daily range is significant.
That daily range is the variation you do feel: between eleven and twelve degrees between the high and the low of the same day, every month. You go out at midday in short sleeves and first thing it is genuinely cool. It is the only layer you need to carry, and you need to carry it on any date.
02 Why the thermometer stays still
Two degrees from the equator, day length barely changes. Without solar seasons, there are no thermal seasons.
The explanation has two parts and both are geographical. The first is latitude: Kigali is less than two degrees from the equator, so day length and the sun's angle barely vary across the year. Without that variation, the main cause of thermal seasons disappears.
The second is altitude, and it is what makes the result liveable. The city sits at 1,567 metres, and those metres lower the temperature constantly throughout the year. Without them, an equatorial city at sea level would have far higher means and nights that never cool.
The result of combining the two is a climate that behaves the same in January as in July, with highs around 27 degrees and lows around 16. The records confirm it: the absolute maximum in the series is 35.4 degrees and the minimum 9.0. Not even the extremes are extreme.
03 Two dry and two wet
If temperature does not organise the year, rain does, and here the distribution is four seasons, not two. There are two wet seasons — March to May and October to December — and two dry ones: a short, sharply marked one in June, July and August, and a briefer, less defined one between January and February.
The figures mark those blocks clearly. The annual total is 953.5 millimetres over 104.2 rain days. April, the maximum, gives 135.5 millimetres over 14.4 days; July, the minimum, gives 10.2 over 0.9 days. That is: in July, on average, it rains on less than one day in the whole month.
Relative humidity follows the same pattern and helps in deciding: 81.3 % in April, in the middle of the wet block, against 54.7 % in July. Almost twenty-seven points of difference. With temperature fixed, that is the variable that really changes how it feels to walk a city this steep.
04 Which month to pick
The good window is June, July and August, and it is not close. June gives 20.3 millimetres over 2.3 days; July, 10.2 over 0.9; August, 30.2 over 3.6. Humidity falls to 63.3 %, 54.7 % and 57.6 %, and the temperature, as always, does not move: 26.7, 27.4 and 28.2 degrees by day.
July is the best of the three by a wide margin, especially if you are going to walk a lot: less than one rain day a month and the driest air on the calendar. September is the reasonable alternative if you need another date, with 64.8 millimetres and 255.6 hours of sunshine.
The months to avoid are March, April, October and November: 129.1, 135.5, 108.8 and 121.2 millimetres, with between 12.5 and 14.4 rain days. In a city of constant gradients, rain every other day changes the plan considerably. January, February and December sit in between and usually turn out well.
