The best time to visit Spain, and the fortnight the calendar hands you in 2027
The best time to visit Spain by region, with the 2027 festival dates, the Andalusian heat records and the quiet fortnight between Semana Santa and the Feria.
Photo · Marian Florinel Condruz · Pexels
Spain is four countries wearing one flag, at least as far as weather goes. May and late September are the best months in almost all of them, and the reasons to deviate are festivals, heat and the Atlantic north.
There is also a specific and unusually good fortnight coming in 2027, which is below.
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The Atlantic north (Galicia, Asturias, Cantabria, the Basque Country) is green because it rains, and it rains far more than the rest of the country. It is the only part of Spain that is comfortable in July and August.
The Mediterranean east (Catalonia, Valencia, Murcia) is mild, dry and hot in summer, with a sea that stays swimmable well into October.
The central plateau (Madrid, Castile, Extremadura) is continental: genuinely cold in winter and genuinely hot in summer, with very little in between.
Andalusia and the south is the hot one, and the numbers are worth stating rather than gesturing at.
The southern heat, in numbers
Seville regularly passes 40 degrees in the afternoon in July and August, and the city record is 47.4°C, set on 14 August 2021. Córdoba and the interior of Andalusia run hotter still.
The cities are built for this and the visitor economy is not. The old towns have shaded lanes, thick walls and a working siesta. The Alhambra, the Alcázar and an archaeological site at two in the afternoon are unshaded stone.
Spain's meteorological agency publishes the temperature records and the heat warnings, and it issues them often in July and August.
If you must go south in summer, treat 1pm to 6pm as indoor time, book a room with a pool or a patio, and take the first slot of the day at anything ticketed. That is not a lifestyle tip; it is how the region itself operates. Where to stay in Seville has the rest, including the fact that Andalusia charges no accommodation tax at all.
The fortnight the 2027 calendar hands you
Semana Santa 2027 runs 21 to 28 March. Seville's Feria de Abril runs 13 to 18 April 2027, with the Alumbrado at midnight on 12 April.
That leaves an unusually short gap between them, and the fortnight in the middle is the single best window in the Andalusian year: warm, everything open, orange blossom finished, heat not started, and rates back to normal for about fifteen days between two weeks that triple them.
On the two festivals themselves:
Semana Santa is extraordinary and it is not a sightseeing week. Processions close streets without notice for hours, and the Alcázar queue, the cathedral and your dinner reservation are all subordinate to where a brotherhood is.
The Feria de Abril looks in photographs like a public festival and it is mostly not. The fairground is over a thousand casetas and the overwhelming majority are private, belonging to families, firms and clubs. A handful are run by the district councils. If the plan is to turn up and be swept into the party, that plan needs an invitation in it. Go for the horses in the afternoon and the Alumbrado on the opening night.
The rest of the festival calendar
Las Fallas, Valencia, 15 to 19 March, annually. Enormous satirical papier mâché sculptures built over months and burned on the final night, with daily explosions in the main square. In 2027 it runs directly into Semana Santa, which makes mid-March to late March a very full stretch in eastern and southern Spain.
San Fermín, Pamplona, 6 to 14 July, annually. The running of the bulls. The town is at capacity and accommodation is booked a year out.
La Tomatina, Buñol, 25 August 2027, always the last Wednesday of August. Ticketed, capped, and an hour of throwing tomatoes near Valencia.
Month by month
January and February. The cheapest and one of the most underrated windows. Mild in Andalusia and on the coast, cold in Madrid and the centre, empty everywhere. Museums and monuments with no queues. Andalusia in February is one of the best value trips in Europe.
March. Improving fast. Las Fallas, and Semana Santa if it falls early. Beautiful in the south, still cold in the centre.
April. Spring properly. The Feria, orange blossom in Seville, green interior. One of the two best months in the south.
May. The best all-round month in Spain. Warm, long days, everything open, no serious heat yet, sea still cold.
June. Excellent, and the heat starts building inland in the second half.
July and August. The two to move. The south and centre are severe, the coast is full, and Spain takes its own holidays in August so cities empty of locals and fill with visitors. Go north, to the Basque Country, Asturias or Galicia, where the weather is at its best and the food is the best in the country.
September. The second best month. The sea is at its warmest after a summer of heating, the crowds thin from mid-month, and the cities are comfortable again.
October. Still warm in the south, the wine harvest inland, low prices from mid-month.
November and December. Mild in the south, wet in the north, and Christmas markets and lights in the cities. The Canaries are the winter beach answer.
Picking a month for a specific trip
Andalusia: late February to May, or October. Never July or August.
Barcelona and the Mediterranean coast: May, June, September, early October. The sea is warmest in September.
Madrid and the centre: April, May, September, October. It is a continental climate and the shoulders are short.
The Atlantic north: June to September, and it is the one region where July and August are the right answer.
The Canaries: any month, and they are the European winter answer.
Skiing: the Sierra Nevada above Granada and the Pyrenees, January to March.
The best time to visit Portugal is the neighbour's version of this question, and the answers differ more than the distance suggests.
Short tourist stays only. Checked 21 Aug 2026; rules change without notice and the government page is the source of truth.
Check your own passport →Checked 21 Aug 2026.
Everything we check for Spain →What to skip
Andalusia in July or August.
Semana Santa as a sightseeing week.
The Feria without an invitation to a caseta.
Pamplona during San Fermín without a booking made a long time ago.
Assuming northern Spain has southern Spain's weather. Galicia and Asturias get more rain than most of Britain.
August in the cities generally. Spain is on holiday, a proportion of the good restaurants are shut, and the ones that are open are serving visitors.
Before you book
Spain in 10 days is the route these months apply to, on three competing railway operators. Three days in Barcelona covers the city in the year the Sagrada Família was finished, and where to stay in Seville, where to stay in Madrid and where to stay in Barcelona have the neighbourhoods. Day trips from Barcelona has Montserrat and the Costa Brava, and the best time to visit Portugal is the comparison next door.
The Seville city guide and the Spain country guide carry the practicalities, and there is more in the when to go hub.
Festival dates and temperature records checked September 2026. Semana Santa moves with Easter each year and regional tourist taxes changed in Catalonia in April 2026, so Spain's national tourism board and the individual regional pages are the sources to confirm rather than any guide, this one included. Here is how we research and re-check guides.
