The year in New Mexico, month by month
The month-by-month figures come from Albuquerque airport, 1991–2020 series, at 1,619 metres: 224.5 millimetres a year over 56.1 days and 3,415 hours of sun. They are contrasted with Santa Fe, at 2,133 metres, and Carlsbad, in the far south, which mark the state's two extremes.
Almost everyone arrives in New Mexico with one fixed idea: desert. And then finds a state capital with a ski area half an hour away and snow in the street in December.
Both things are true, because they are different places in the same state.
01 Fifty-one centimetres of snow against two and a half
The clearest comparison is snow. Santa Fe, the capital, sits at 2,133 metres and accumulates 51.3 centimetres of snow a year. Carlsbad, in the southeastern corner of the state, accumulates 2.5.
Twenty times more, within the same borders. Albuquerque, which is in between and at 1,619 metres, comes to 20.1 centimetres: exactly the intermediate point its altitude would predict.
The rule that organises all this is simple and useful for planning any trip here: in New Mexico latitude matters less than altitude. Going up six hundred metres is equivalent to moving a good deal further north.
Fifty-one centimetres of snow in the capital and two and a half in the south: the difference is not set by the month, it is set by the altitude.
02 January: from six degrees to fifteen
In January, Santa Fe's average maximum is 6.1 degrees and its minimum −7.8. Albuquerque's, 9.1 and −3.1. Carlsbad's, 14.8 and −1.1.
Between the two extremes there are almost nine degrees of difference in the maximum and almost seven in the minimum, which means on the same January day you may need winter clothing in the north and a shirt at midday in the south.
The historic extremes complete the picture. Albuquerque's cold record is −27.2 degrees, recorded in January. This is not a mild climate: it is a dry one, which is not the same thing.
03 July: from thirty to thirty-six
In summer the scale flips but the logic is the same. The average July maximum is 29.9 degrees in Santa Fe, 32.9 in Albuquerque and 35.8 in Carlsbad.
Six degrees of difference, which in practice separate a place where you can walk all day from one where you have to stop at midday. Minima run from 12.8 degrees in Santa Fe to 21.5 in Carlsbad.
And there lies the state's most useful planning trick: if the trip falls in July or August, gaining altitude solves the heat without changing month. Santa Fe in high summer is cooler than Carlsbad in April.
04 Two hundred and twenty-four millimetres and three thousand four hundred hours of sun
What the whole state does share is dryness. Albuquerque collects 224.5 millimetres of rain a year over 56.1 days. That is, it rains on slightly under one day in six, and the annual total fits into what other regions get in a month.
The counterpart is sunshine: 3,415 hours a year, 77 per cent of the possible maximum. June reaches 83 per cent, with 359 hours in a single month, and no month falls below 73.
What rain there is concentrates: July and August add 75 millimetres over 17 days, a third of the annual total, in the form of brief, intense afternoon storms. The rest of the year relative humidity runs around 30 to 50 per cent.
05 The night, which takes fifteen degrees off
There is one figure worth internalising before packing, and it appears in no headline: the difference between the daily maximum and minimum in Albuquerque runs about twelve to fifteen degrees all year round.
In July, the hottest month, the average maximum is 32.9 degrees and the minimum 19.2: thirteen point seven of range. In January, 9.1 and −3.1: twelve point two. Dry air does not hold the day's heat and the ground radiates it as soon as the sun goes down.
Add altitude and the result is that here you always need one more layer than the forecast suggests. In Santa Fe, in the middle of July, the average minimum is 12.8 degrees.
06 How to choose the month
September and October are the best months on the calendar without argument. Highs drop from 28.1 to 21.4 degrees, rain withdraws to 29.2 and 22.1 millimetres, and sunshine holds at 287 and 281 hours.
April and May are the second option, with highs of 21.3 and 26.6 degrees and the annual minimum of rainy days, 2.8 in April. The drawback is wind: in spring it blows persistently and raises dust on the plateau.
And if the trip falls in summer or winter, the decision is not about dates but about altitude. In July, go north and up; in January, go south and down. The state gives you six degrees of leeway in either direction without touching the calendar.
The year's four stretches
21.3 to 26.6 degrees of maximum and 6.2 to 11.3 of minimum, with 11.2 to 13.0 millimetres a month over 2.8 to 3.7 days and 305 to 347 hours of sun. The price is wind, which at this time is constant.
Highs of 31.6 to 32.9 degrees. June is the driest, sunniest summer month; July and August add 75 millimetres over 17 days, a third of the annual rainfall concentrated in afternoon storms.
From 28.1 to 21.4 degrees of maximum and 14.5 to 7.8 of minimum, with 22.1 to 29.2 millimetres a month and 281 to 287 hours of sun. Open sky, clean air and the Rio Grande cottonwoods in yellow.
Albuquerque moves between 8.5 and 17.1 degrees of maximum with sub-zero minima. Santa Fe, 500 metres higher, drops to 6.1 and −7.8 and gets 51.3 centimetres of snow a year; Carlsbad, in the south, 2.5.
