Climate averages 1991–2020

Cairns weather
in January.

A hot, very wet month: one of the warmest and the 11th driest of the year.

Long-term climate patterns, not a forecast for a particular trip.

Average high 29.7°C Daytime mean, January

Average low 24.8°C Night-time mean, January

Rainfall 245 mm 21 days with ≥1 mm

Daylight 13 h Sunrise to sunset, per day

January is a hot month in Cairns: daytime highs average 29.7°C and nights cool to about 24.8°C. By daytime temperature it is one of the warmest months of the year.

Expect about 245 mm of rain on roughly 21 days, which makes January a very wet month (the 11th driest of the 12 months). Daylight, from sunrise to sunset, lasts about 13 h 01 min on an average January day.

The nearest other city in this atlas is Townsville (283 km away). In January its highs average 30.7°C, 1.0°C warmer than Cairns, with 208 mm of rain.

Among the 32 cities listed in Australia, Cairns ranks 6th of 32 for the warmest January highs and 31st of 32 for the driest January (rainfall, lowest first). The mean January high of those 32 cities is 27.2°C; Cairns is 2.5°C warmer than that mean.

From January to February, average highs fall by 0.1°C to 29.6°C, and monthly rainfall rises from 245 mm to 256 mm.

The annual picture

January in context

30-year average

Average highAverage low°C

Monthly rainfall

Average total · mm

Averages from hourly ERA5 reanalysis data. Actual weather varies from year to year. How these numbers are calculated

Every month, side by side

Cairns climate table

1991–2020

Monthly climate averages for Cairns, 1991–2020
Month	Average highHigh / low	Average low	Rainfall mm/month	Rain days ≥1 mm/day	Daylight hours/dayDaylight h/day
January, selected	29.7°C24.8°C	24.8°C	245	21.2	13.013 h
February	29.6°C24.9°C	24.9°C	256	20.9	12.713 h
March	28.7°C24.2°C	24.2°C	206	17.9	12.212 h
April	27.3°C22.9°C	22.9°C	94	12.7	11.712 h
May	25.6°C21.2°C	21.2°C	41	9.5	11.311 h
June	24.2°C19.5°C	19.5°C	27	7.0	11.111 h
July	23.5°C18.6°C	18.6°C	27	5.9	11.211 h
August	24.3°C18.7°C	18.7°C	23	5.5	11.512 h
September	26.3°C20.2°C	20.2°C	14	4.1	12.012 h
October	27.7°C21.8°C	21.8°C	31	6.5	12.512 h
November	29.0°C23.3°C	23.3°C	57	10.4	12.913 h
December	29.7°C24.4°C	24.4°C	142	16.1	13.113 h

Rainfall is the average of the 30 separate monthly totals. A rain day is a local calendar day with at least 1 mm of precipitation. Daylight is the calculated sunrise-to-sunset length, not measured sunshine.

Compare places

January in nearby cities

Distance from Cairns

Read the numbers correctly

Climate, not a promise.

These patterns help compare months. They cannot tell you the weather on a specific day of your trip.

Sources, method and limits

How these numbers are made (what the highs, lows and rain days mean, the sources and the model cell used for Cairns) is explained once on the Cairns year overview and on the Sources, method and limits page.