The climate in Norway

Climate zone: The northern part of Norway is located in the cold polar zone of the Arctic. The southern areas in the temperate climatic zone.

It won't be really warm here and given to the water temperatures of 17 degrees maximum you will leave your bathing togs at home. Due to the warmer temperatures the best time for traveling is from May to September. Winter athletes will find their favorite weather conditions from November to March.

› Duration of daylight and sunshine in Norway

Temperature records of the last 70 years

The hottest temperature measured from 1949 to December 2019 was reported by the Oslo Blindern weather station. In July 2018 the record temperature of 34.6 °C was reported here. The hottest summer from July to September, based on all 21 weather stations in Norway below 970 metres altitude, was recorded in 2006 with an average temperature of 14.2 °C. This average temperature will normally be measured every 4 to 6 hours, thus also including the nights. Normally, this value is 12.5 degrees Celsius. The average maximum daily temperature at that time was 18.2 °C.

The coldest day in these 70 years was reported by the weather station Karasjok. Here the temperature dropped to -42.2 °C in January 2016. Karasjok lies at an altitude of 131 meters above sea level. The coldest winter (January to March) was in 1966 with an average temperature of -5.0 °C. In Norway, it is usual to have about 3.5 degrees more at -1.4 °C for this three-month period.

Long-term development of temperatures from 1989 - 2019

In contrast to single record values, a long-term development cannot simply be brought about by all weather stations in the country. Both the number and the locations are constantly changing. A simply calculated average value would give a falsified result. If several measuring stations in particularly cold mountain or coastal regions are added in one year, the average would already decrease as a result of this alone. If a station fails during the summer or winter months, it does not provide any values and falsifies the average again. The subsequent long-term development was therefore reduced to only 5 measuring points in order to have actually comparable data over as long a period as possible.

In the years 1989 to 2019 there were only these 5 weather stations in the whole country, which reported continuous temperature values. From these weather reports we have created a long-term development that shows the monthly average temperatures. The hottest month in this entire period was Juli 2014 with 17.7 °C. Februar 2010 was the coldest month with an average temperature of -4.8 °C.

The average annual temperature was about 6.1 °C in the years after 1989 and about 6.6 °C in the last years before 2019. It has therefore increased only slightly by about 0.4 °C over the past 31 years. This trend only applies to the selected 5 weather stations in Norway. A considerably more comprehensive evaluation of the global warming has been provided separately.




More detailed information on global warming with a view by continent can also be found on our topic page on climate change.