With a mild Mediterranean climate and over 300 sunny days a year, anytime is a good time to come to Nice… but the best time is in the spring and the autumn, when the weather in Nice is warm and sunny but not overly hot.
Winters can be very seductive on the Cote as well; at the turn of the century Nice was only a winter resort, an escape from the bleak winters elsewhere in Europe, and only the nouvelle riche who didn’t know any better would come to Nice in the heat of the summer!
Winter in Monte Carlo
Winters on the Cote d’Azur are sunny and crisp, with no crowds, and a real village feel. The coldest it gets is in the 40′s (5-7c) and most winter days it gets up to the mid 50′s (13-15c). Expect 6-7 days of rain a month during the winter, and maybe a dusting of snow only once every couple of years (although in just 2 hours you can be schussing at an alpine ski resort!).
Really, the only month to avoid, ironically, is August, when temperatures are at their highest in the high 80′s (28-29c), and all of Europe goes on a month’s vacation, jamming the beaches, hotels and restaurants.
Reliability of Nice Weather Forecasts: Because of Nice’s situation with the sea in front and the mountains close behind, it can be difficult to predict the weather, but my personal rule-of-thumb is that if the forecast is for sun, it will be sunny, and if the forecast is for anything else, there is a 50% chance that it will be… sunny! In fact, Nice has around 300 days of sun a year.
Click here for a chart of average Nice temperatures by month, the highs and lows, and rainfall for each month, based on the last 8 years.
Here’s the 10-day forecast for Nice now, and click here for an up-to-the-hour webcam view of the beach and the Promenade des Anglais today.
Photo credits: Nice travel poster and L’hiver a Nice poster available from Zazzle.com.
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