Tempe Asu, AZ Climate: Temperature & Rain by Month
Annual temperature and rainfall from NOAA NCEI's 1991–2020 normals →; comfort score computed by PlainClimate
30-year climate normals (1991-2020) from Tempe Asu's primary NOAA station, TEMPE ASU.
The climate verdict for Tempe Asu
Tempe Asu, Arizona is cooling-led and dry. Its 8.8 inches of annual precipitation pairs with an annual average of 72°F. It scores 77/100 for climate comfort (good), putting it in the top third of station-mapped location scores and exceeding 70% of them.
- 72°F
- annual average temperature (NOAA normal)
- 77/100
- comfort score, above 70% of station-mapped location scores
- 8.8"
- yearly precipitation total
- 295 days
- frost-free growing season
Tempe Asu: NOAA 1991-2020 normals describe a typical year, not a forecast. Method: /methodology.
Normals record plate
Sheet USC00028499 · Tempe Asu, AZ 72°F mean · 8.8" precip
TEMP-HOT · RANK-WARM · PHOTO-FINISH · PRCP-ARID · SWING-MID · COMF-TOP · LOAD-COOL · STN-1 · BOOK-FULL
- TEMP-HOT 72°F
- RANK-WARM #6,655
- PHOTO-FINISH ≈ Tilden
- PRCP-ARID 8.8"
- SWING-MID 37°F
- COMF-TOP 77/100
- LOAD-COOL 3,681 CDD
- STN-1 USC00028499
- BOOK-FULL 6/6 fields
Nearest mean-temperature peer: Tilden, TX (+ 0 °F mean)
Instrument codes from this station's NOAA 1991–2020 normals, mean temperature, corpus warmth rank, photo-finish peer station, precipitation band, seasonal swing, comfort composite, degree-day load, and field book, not a livability rating.
Mean-temperature neighbourhood
Nationwide NOAA normal poles and nearest peers, not a reprint of every AZ station list.
- Tempe Asu (this station) 72°F
- Hot Benavides, TX 72°F
- Near Tilden, TX 72°F
- Near Apache Junction, AZ 72°F
- Cold South Phoenix, AZ 71°F
Climate Living Index · Tempe Asu
Tempe Asu: 58/100 · grade C
Tempe Asu publishes 5 of 6 Living Index dimensions (NOAA annual/seasonal normals · NOAA daily multivariate normals); 1 missing weight rescale to 100.
PlainClimate-derived for Tempe Asu, not an official NOAA rating. Rankings still use Comfort Score 77/100 (separate formula). Breakpoints and limits.
| Dimension | Station value | Score |
|---|---|---|
| Frost-free season | 295 days/year | 100/100 · A |
| Snowfall burden | 0.0 inches/year | 90/100 · A |
| Annual temperature balance | 71.8°F · 4.3° from 67.5°F | 87/100 · A |
| Normal heat + freeze calendar | 173 calendar days | 30/100 · F |
| Precipitation balance | 8.8 in · 26.2 from 35 in | 9/100 · F |
Tempe Asu · 2026-08-04 · NOAA NCEI Climate Normals · method · Comfort Score method.
Tempe Asu's normals sit in a dry climate class: BWh
Annual precipitation falls well below the aridity threshold for this temperature regime, so the normals classify as hot desert (BWh). Class BWh is the Peel et al. (2007) label for this station's monthly mean temperature and precipitation normals: dry (arid or semi-arid), specifically hot desert.
- Köppen code
- BWh
- Group
- Dry (arid or semi-arid)
- Warmest month
- 90.9°F
- Coldest month
- 53.5°F
Source: official public datasets monthly normals (1991–2020) at the city’s primary station. This is a station classification, not a mapped regional consensus.
National standing · cooling-led station
Where Tempe Asu sits across the climate record
Three NOAA fields for Tempe Asu's primary station, temperature, precipitation, and seasonal swing, are ranked against every station-mapped normal that carries the same field.
- Annual temperature
- Top 3% warmest
- Among 6,861 stations, Tempe Asu sits in the warmer third of annual means.
- Annual precipitation
- Drier than 96%
- Tempe Asu's annual total ranks in the drier third of 6,352 measured normals.
- Seasonal temperature swing
- Narrower than 75%
- Warmest-to-coldest month gap for Tempe Asu is compact versus 6,861 complete station-years.
How Tempe Asu compares across U.S. station-mapped locations
Tempe Asu's comfort score vs. all station-mapped locations
PlainClimate composite comfort index (1–100), NOAA 1991–2020 normals
77 Top 30% score exceeds 70% of 6,189 station-mapped location scores
- 0–10: 0 station-mapped locations (0%). Below this entry.
- 10–20: 0 station-mapped locations (0%). Below this entry.
- 20–30: 96 station-mapped locations (2%). Below this entry.
- 30–40: 280 station-mapped locations (5%). Below this entry.
- 40–50: 1,113 station-mapped locations (18%). Below this entry.
- 50–60: 1,329 station-mapped locations (21%). Below this entry.
- 60–70: 1,236 station-mapped locations (20%). Below this entry.
- 70–80: 650 station-mapped locations (11%). This entry sits in this band.
- 80–90: 921 station-mapped locations (15%). Above this entry.
- 90–100: 564 station-mapped locations (9%). Above this entry.
Source NOAA U.S. Climate Normals, PlainClimate comfort index · 1991–2020
Monthly Temperatures
Average daily high and low temperatures by month
| Month | Avg High | Avg Low | Mean | Precip | Snow | Freeze Days | 90°F+ Days |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| January | 71°F (21°C) | 39°F (4°C) | 55°F (13°C) | 1.0" | 0.0" | 3.1 | 0.0 |
| February | 74°F (23°C) | 41°F (5°C) | 57°F (14°C) | 1.1" | 0.0" | 1.8 | 0.0 |
| March | 80°F (27°C) | 46°F (8°C) | 63°F (17°C) | 1.0" | 0.0" | 0.2 | 2.5 |
| April | 87°F (31°C) | 51°F (11°C) | 69°F (21°C) | 0.2" | 0.0" | 0.0 | 11.4 |
| May | 95°F (35°C) | 59°F (15°C) | 77°F (25°C) | 0.2" | 0.0" | 0.0 | 23.9 |
| June | 104°F (40°C) | 67°F (19°C) | 85°F (30°C) | 0.1" | 0.0" | 0.0 | 29.5 |
| July | 106°F (41°C) | 76°F (24°C) | 91°F (33°C) | 1.0" | 0.0" | 0.0 | 31.0 |
| August | 105°F (40°C) | 75°F (24°C) | 90°F (32°C) | 1.3" | 0.0" | 0.0 | 30.8 |
| September | 101°F (38°C) | 69°F (21°C) | 85°F (29°C) | 0.7" | 0.0" | 0.0 | 29.1 |
| October | 91°F (33°C) | 56°F (13°C) | 74°F (23°C) | 0.6" | 0.0" | 0.0 | 18.7 |
| November | 79°F (26°C) | 45°F (7°C) | 62°F (17°C) | 0.7" | 0.0" | 0.5 | 2.2 |
| December | 69°F (21°C) | 38°F (3°C) | 54°F (12°C) | 0.9" | 0.0" | 4.1 | 0.0 |
The year, day by day
The year in Tempe Asu runs from a mild 37°F around December 21 to 106°F at the peak near July 3, and the normal low never reaches freezing on any date in the record.
When the heat sits
Normal highs reach 90°F from April 30 through October 19, covering 173 dates. The broader mild season, normal highs of 70°F or more, runs January 10 to December 8.
This counts calendar dates whose 1991–2020 normal high reaches 90°F. It is a smaller number than the 90°F+ day counts in the monthly table above, which measure how often the threshold was actually crossed in a typical year. A date can average 88°F and still exceed 90°F in half of all years.
No freezing date
Not one calendar date in the 1991–2020 record carries a normal low at or below 32°F. The coldest normal low of the year is 37°F around December 21.
Where the wet dates fall
The likeliest wet date is February 13, when 16% of years recorded at least a hundredth of an inch. The driest is June 9 at 2%. Summed across the calendar, that is about 34 wet dates a year.
The widest day
June 6 carries the biggest normal gap between afternoon and dawn, 38°F between the normal high and the normal low.
Look up any date
Any date's 1991–2020 normal for Tempe Asu.
Where Tempe Asu Stands Nationally
Summers here run among the most heat-heavy normals calendars in the country: on about 173 days a year the normal daily high itself reaches 90°F — a count fewer than one station in ten exceeds.
Aridity defines the water calendar: about 9 inches in a normal year lands this among the driest tenth of ranked stations.
Tempe Asu earns 2 nationally notable standings (outer quintiles) against 6,860 NOAA 1991–2020 normals stations; only those extremes render.
Monthly Precipitation
Average monthly rainfall and snowfall
4.4 days with precipitation
4.5 days with precipitation
3.3 days with precipitation
1.3 days with precipitation
1.2 days with precipitation
0.6 days with precipitation
3.7 days with precipitation
4.5 days with precipitation
2.9 days with precipitation
2.3 days with precipitation
2.0 days with precipitation
3.6 days with precipitation
Tempe Asu's wet season runs through the cold months
December, January and February carry 35% of the year's precipitation here, while June through August contribute 27%. That is the cool-season-dominant pattern of the West Coast and the higher inland West, where storm tracks swing south in winter and summer turns dry; the thermometer meanwhile shows a 37.4°F seasonal spread.
- Wettest month
- August, 1.3"
- Driest month
- June, 0.1"
- Wettest three months
- August, February, January (39% of the year)
Shares are computed from this station's own 1991-2020 monthly precipitation normals. A cool-season label means the December-February share reaches 35%. Where snow falls, the monthly figures above report liquid-equivalent precipitation, so a wet winter month is not necessarily a rainy one.
How Tempe Asu's precipitation splits across the calendar
About 34 days a year record measurable precipitation here, carrying 8.8" between them, or roughly 0.26 inches on a typical wet day. That sits in the middle band: neither the many-light-days pattern of the Pacific Northwest and the Great Lakes, nor the few-heavy-events pattern of the Gulf and the desert Southwest.
A wet day is one recording at least 0.01 inches. These are 1991-2020 normals: they describe an average year and say nothing about the heaviest single storm on record.
Tempe Asu's record shows no measurable snowfall
This station measured snowfall across the 1991-2020 period and recorded none: the annual normal is 0.0 inches. That is a measured zero rather than missing data, which is a meaningful distinction here , most stations in the database simply do not report snow at all, and those pages say nothing about it.
A thirty-year normal of zero describes the typical year at this station. It is not a claim that snow has never fallen in the area.
Frost Dates & Growing Season
First Fall Freeze
December 5
50% probability date
Last Spring Freeze
February 13
50% probability date
Growing Season
295 days
Heating & Cooling Degree Days
Annual totals indicate energy demand for heating and cooling
Heating Degree Days
1,183
Higher = more heating needed
Cooling Degree Days
3,681
Higher = more cooling needed
Warmest Month
July
Coldest Month
December
Nationwide similar cities
Other rankable U.S. places outside AZ closest to Tempe Asu on two NOAA annual-normal axes (mean temperature and annual precipitation). Chip rows use distinct link sets.
Closest by average temperature
Nearest out-of-state peers by annual mean temperature (72°F here).
- Encinal, TX 72°F · 0.0°F off
- Freer, TX 72°F · 0.0°F off
- Tilden, TX 72°F · 0.0°F off
- Hallettsville, TX 72°F · 0.1°F off
Closest by annual precipitation
Nearest out-of-state peers by annual precipitation (8.8" here), excluding temperature-peer places.
- Pavillion, WY 8.8" · 0.0" off
- Hermiston, OR 8.8" · 0.0" off
- El Paso, TX 8.8" · 0.0" off
- Connell, WA 8.8" · 0.0" off
Scarce-water calendar
Where Tempe Asu's limited precipitation lands
cooling led · dry · mid swing
Air-conditioning demand is the clearest thermal signal here. Tempe Asu accumulates 3,681 cooling degree days, more than twice its 1,183 heating total; the monthly table shows when that imbalance builds rather than treating it as a year-round condition.
Heat demand sits beside limited local precipitation: Tempe Asu receives 8.8 inches in a normal year, inside PlainClimate's dry range. Recorded annual snowfall is negligible. Month-level precipitation is the useful check on when that small annual total arrives.
July and December mark the typical warm and cold ends of the calendar in Tempe Asu's middle-range seasonal profile. The measured spread is 37.4°F. The annual average is 72°F. Neither the annual mean nor one extreme month represents the full calendar on its own.
Tempe Asu has a long frost-free window of roughly 295 days, but the dry annual profile is a separate constraint. Growing-season length says when freezes are unlikely, not whether rainfall is sufficient.
Tempe Asu wettest normal
August
August concentrates the scarce annual total (8.8 inches).
Tempe Asu driest normal
June
June is typically driest; arid stations are defined by when water is absent, not by a four-season grid.
Questions about Tempe Asu's climate
How dry is Tempe Asu? ▼
How many days above 90°F does Tempe Asu get? ▼
How much energy does heating and cooling require in Tempe Asu? ▼
Data Sources
Data source: NOAA U.S. Climate Normals v1.0.1 (1991-2020). All figures on this page are from Tempe Asu's primary station: TEMPE ASU (USC00028499). For informational purposes only.
Place identity: U.S. Census Bureau 2024 Gazetteer places. The conservative exact name-and-state crosswalk finds no Census place match, so PlainClimate treats this as a station-mapped location and does not claim it is a municipality. No exact Gazetteer row for Tempe Asu; facility counts that depend on place identity are therefore an upper bound, not a municipal census.
On this page every temperature, precipitation, and derived score for Tempe Asu comes from its primary NOAA station record. No figure on this page is typed in by an editor - each value is rendered from NOAA 1991-2020 U.S. Climate Normals. See our editorial standards & corrections policy, the methodology behind these numbers, or report a data error. Data current as of 1991–2020 normals.