South Dakota Climate Data

Climate Insight: South Dakota

South Dakota's climate profile is aggregated from 152 cities and 277 NOAA weather stations reporting under the 1991–2020 U.S. Climate Normals program. The statewide average annual temperature sits at 46°F, which is the simple average across all measured stations rather than any single city's reading. Because South Dakota spans multiple latitudes, elevations, and proximities to large water bodies, local conditions can differ from this headline number by wide margins, coastal, valley, and mountain stations often diverge by ten degrees or more even within a single month.

Precipitation and snowfall averages round out the climatological picture. Across South Dakota, annual precipitation averages 21.9 inches, with typical seasonal snowfall near 44.2 inches statewide. These numbers combine rain, sleet, and snow water-equivalent and describe the thirty-year normal rather than any particular recent year. Readers evaluating a specific destination should drill into one of the 152 individual city pages below, each city's climate varies based on local geography, and the statewide figures here are averages that mask meaningful intrastate differences.

For planning purposes, the city table above is sorted to help you compare averages side-by-side: annual mean temperature, average daily high and low, precipitation totals, snowfall, and PlainClimate's composite comfort score. A city's comfort score weighs temperature mildness, humidity, and extreme-weather frequency into a single 0–100 rating, which is especially useful when contrasting locations at different elevations or distances from the coast. Use these rankings as a starting point, then open each city page for monthly breakdowns, degree-day totals, frost dates, and humidity metrics that matter for gardening, energy budgeting, and relocation decisions.