Tallahassee Seasonal Weather Patterns

Tallahassee has two wet stretches, a big summer peak from June to August and a smaller late winter peak in March, separated by drier spells in April and May and again in October and November (Florida Climate Center).

The 1991 to 2020 normals for Tallahassee Municipal Airport, published by the Florida Climate Center at Florida State University, give the city 58.81 inches of rain in a normal year. June is the wettest month at 7.76 inches, with August at 7.60 and July at 7.14. March, at 5.24 inches, is the wettest month outside summer, and November is the driest at 3.10 inches (Florida Climate Center).

Temperature follows a simpler curve. Normal Tallahassee highs climb from 63.9 degrees in January to 92.1 in July, and normal lows from 40.5 to 73.2 in August, for an annual mean of 68.4 degrees (Florida Climate Center).

April and May are Tallahassee's warm, dry spring months, with normal highs of 80.2 and 87.4 degrees and only 3.53 and 3.36 inches of rain before the June wet season begins (Florida Climate Center).

Spring is when Leon County heating gives way to cooling. Heating degree days at the Tallahassee airport fall from 163 in March to 52 in April and 4 in May, while cooling degree days rise from 51 in March to 121 in April and 320 in May (Florida Climate Center). Normal lows climb from 54.4 degrees in April to 63.0 in May.

The dry spell matters because it comes just as temperatures rise. May, at 3.36 inches, is drier than every month except October and November on the Tallahassee normals, and the 1991 to 2020 table shows rainfall more than doubling from May to June (Florida Climate Center). The freeze warning calendar shifts in spring too: after the first widespread light freeze, NWS Tallahassee suspends routine freeze warnings for the rest of the cool season, usually until March 15, with the main exception of a hard freeze of 25 degrees or lower (NWS Tallahassee).

A Tallahassee summer averages highs of 90.8 to 92.1 degrees from June through August, with about 22.5 inches of rain across those three months (Florida Climate Center).

Nights stay warm too: normal Tallahassee lows are 70.8 in June, 73.0 in July and 73.2 in August. The jump into the wet season is sharp. Normal rainfall goes from 3.36 inches in May to 7.76 inches in June, more than double, and stays above 7 inches through August before falling to 4.91 in September (Florida Climate Center). Cooling demand follows the heat: July averages 544 cooling degree days and August 538, out of 2,758 for the year.

The NWS Tallahassee daily records show how far the extremes reach. The record high for July 3 is 104 degrees, set in 1931, and July 15 also has a 104-degree record, from 1932, against a normal July high of 92 at the Tallahassee station (NWS Tallahassee normals and records). Summer also overlaps the Atlantic hurricane season, which runs June 1 to November 30 and peaks on September 10, with most activity between mid-August and mid-October (National Hurricane Center); the Tallahassee hurricane season guide covers storm preparation in detail.

October and November are Tallahassee's driest months on the 1991 to 2020 normals, at 3.24 and 3.10 inches, after 4.91 inches in September and before 4.24 in December (Florida Climate Center).

Fall is also when Tallahassee heat breaks. The normal high drops from 88.6 degrees in September to 81.7 in October and 72.5 in November, and normal lows fall from 69.6 to 58.8 and then 48.0 (Florida Climate Center). Heating demand starts again in October, with 39 heating degree days, and rises to 190 in November.

Normals are averages, and 2026 shows how far a single Tallahassee year can stray. The NWS Tallahassee climate summary for October 14, 2026 records 6.71 inches of rain in the first two weeks of October, against a normal of 1.63 for that point in the month, yet 38.31 inches since January 1 against a normal of 49.86, a shortfall of 11.55 inches. The same report shows a high of 90 degrees on October 14, 8 degrees above normal (NWS Tallahassee daily climate summary). Separately, Florida DEP reports that Lake Jackson, north of Tallahassee, is in a dry down, which it ties to prolonged drought, a lack of heavy local rain and evapotranspiration, and that its Porter Hole sink drained again after the lake held average levels from December 2023 to October 2025 (Florida DEP).

Tallahassee's average first frost comes on November 10, its first freeze on November 25 and its first hard freeze on December 23, based on the 1991 to 2020 normals for the airport station (NWS Tallahassee).

The National Weather Service office in Tallahassee uses three thresholds: frost at 36 degrees, freeze at 32 and hard freeze at 25. It issues frost advisories when temperatures are forecast between 32 and 36 degrees on calm nights with humidity near 100 percent, and freeze watches and warnings for 32 or lower for at least 2 hours (NWS Tallahassee). Tallahassee's first freeze comes well before Apalachicola's, which averages its first freeze on December 13 and its first hard freeze on January 20.

A practical point the forecast office makes itself: in winter the Tallahassee airport is often quite a bit cooler than areas inside the city limits, especially on clear nights with calm winds (NWS Tallahassee). Last verified: October 15, 2026, on the NWS Tallahassee and Florida Climate Center websites.

Tallahassee winters bring January normals of 63.9 degrees for the high and 40.5 for the low, and steady rain of about 4 to 5 inches a month from December to March (Florida Climate Center).

January is the coldest month at the Tallahassee airport and carries the most heating demand, 405 heating degree days out of 1,473 for the year. December brings 4.24 inches of rain, January 4.41, February 4.28 and March 5.24, so the cool season in Tallahassee is not a dry season at all (Florida Climate Center). The rain eases only in April (3.53 inches) and May (3.36), the warm, dry run-up to the summer rains.

The NWS Tallahassee record table shows how deep a Tallahassee cold snap can go: the record low for February 13 is -2 degrees, set in 1899 and the lowest figure anywhere in that daily table, whose record period the daily climate report dates to 1896 (NWS Tallahassee normals and records, NWS Tallahassee daily climate summary). The Tallahassee snow guide covers the rare winter storms that brought snow to the city.