Roatán weather: what a forecast cannot tell you

A forecast tells you it will rain. It does not tell you whether that rain lasts twenty minutes or ruins the day, which months the sea is flat enough for a boat to go out, or which month I would talk a traveller out of. That is what this page is for. I have lived on Roatán since 2014 and I take people out on the water for a living.

Roatán today

Right now on Roatán

These readings are more than 12 hours old.

Air

26 °C

dew point 26 °C

measured at the airport

METAR MHRO · September 23, 22:00

Wind on the island

3.7 km/h

variable

measured at the airport

METAR MHRO · September 23, 22:00

Swell

1.22 m

4.9 s · E

open sea, not the West End dock

WAVEWATCH III · September 24, 01:00

Wind offshore

17 km/h

ESE

Rain : 1.25 mm/h

NCEP GFS · September 24, 00:00

Today's tides

1. 04:20 high 0.62 m
2. 10:37 low 0.18 m
3. 16:53 high 0.53 m
4. 22:31 low 0.20 m

NOAA CO-OPS TEC5655 · Port Royal, Isla de Roatan · September 24, 2026

Swell over the next days, 6 am to 6 pm

1. Thu Sep 24 0.6 to 1 m E · 6 s
2. Fri Sep 25 0.6 to 0.9 m E · 4 s calmest of these days
3. Sat Sep 26 0.7 to 1.1 m E · 5 s
4. Sun Sep 27 0.7 to 1 m E · 5 s
5. Mon Sep 28 1.1 to 1.4 m E · 5 s
6. Tue Sep 29 1.8 to 2.2 m E · 7 s

WAVEWATCH III · forecast pulled September 24, 00:55

Open-sea forecast on a 55 km grid, not the wave at the dock. The numbers only: whether a boat goes out is a call made on the day.

The satellite view below shows what is actually moving over the island right now. It is the honest answer to “is something coming”, and it beats any number I could write here and leave to go stale.

The reef right now

Sea temperature

85.6 °F

Our September normal is 85.5 °F.

Computed from 2,890 satellite readings, 2003 to 2026. NOAA publishes its own anomaly of 1.7 °F against a different baseline, and the two are not the same figure.

Bleaching

Watch

Level 1 of 4 on NOAA's scale. The east side of the island is one step higher.

Accumulated heat stress, in degree heating weeks, by area

Area	Degree heating weeks	Status
West End	0.17	Watch
Coxen Hole	0.61	Watch
Mary's Place	0.60	Watch
Port Royal	0.89	Warning
Guanaja	1.84	Warning

NOAA scale

1. 0 No stress HotSpot ≤ 0 No bleaching
2. 1 Watch 0 < HotSpot < 1 reading today
3. 2 Warning 0 < DHW < 4 Risk of possible bleaching reading today
4. 3 Alert level 1 4 ≤ DHW < 8 Risk of reef-wide bleaching
5. 4 Alert level 2 8 ≤ DHW < 12 Risk of reef-wide bleaching, with mortality of heat-sensitive corals

NOAA's scale continues above what is shown here: levels 3, 4 and 5 cover multi-species mortality, then more than 50 %, then more than 80 % of corals. The 5 km grid genuinely tells one side of the island from the other, but it does not resolve a single dive site.

Reading of September 19, 2026, NOAA Coral Reef Watch, 5 km grid.

Load the sea temperature map The map loads only when you ask for it.

Map by Windy

Load the sea temperature map The map loads only when you ask for it.

Map by Windy

When it rains on Roatán

The wet months are August, September, October, November, December. October counts the most rainy days of the year, 15 on average, and November receives the most water, 207.3 mm. Across a full year the island gets 1059.2 mm.

And yes, Roatán has a dry season, whatever some travel pages say. April averages 2 rainy days and March 3, against 15 in October. That is not a small difference, it is about 8 times more rainy days.

The part a rain total hides: tropical rain here usually arrives as a shower and moves on. A month with 15 rainy days out of 31 is not a month of grey skies, it is a month where you plan around the afternoon.

Why those months and not others? Because the planet's rain belt — the intertropical convergence zone — follows the sun, a month or two behind. When the sun passes straight overhead at Roatán in early May (see how high the sun gets, below), it drags that belt north: rainfall climbs from 35.2 mm in May to 86.9 mm in July. When the sun goes back down, so does the belt.

⚖️ It also explains what surprises visitors: the wettest month is not midsummer, it is November. The rain belt crosses the island again on its way south, and hurricane season adds its own moisture. August takes a breath — 55.8 mm against 86.9 mm in July — what Hondurans call the canícula. One dip in a monthly average is thin evidence, and we are not going to promise it.

The best month to come

On weather alone, April and March are the driest months of the year — 2 and 3 rainy days on average, with daytime temperatures around 28 °C / 82 °F.

Temperature is not a deciding factor here. The warmest month averages 29 °C (84 °F) and the coolest 25 °C (77 °F). The entire year fits inside about four degrees. Nobody picks a month on that. Rain, wind and the state of the sea are what change a trip.

Two things this page deliberately does not decide for you. Seaweed runs on its own calendar, and it has its own page: where to go to avoid sargassum. And hurricane season is a question of record, not of forecast — see below.

The other half of the question: how busy is the island?

Roatán is a cruise port, and the number of passengers landing on an average day goes from 3,879 to 8,383 depending on the month. No weather page tells you that.

Month	Rainy days	Passengers per day	Days with a ship
January	8	7,994	77 %
February	5	8,066	75 %
March	3	7,520	77 %
April	2	6,361	67 %
May	4	4,660	45 %
June	8	4,736	53 %
July	7	5,311	52 %
August	9	3,949	48 %
September	12	4,221	60 %
October	15	3,879	58 %
November	13	6,946	80 %
December	9	8,383	81 %

passengers per day, 2026

December is the busiest month of the year, with 259,877 cruise passengers landing over the month. May is almost as dry and lands 44% fewer. And October is both the wettest month and the quietest: 15 rainy days, and fewer passengers than any other month.

This is the published schedule for 2026, not a historical record. Cruise lines move calls. Only a year whose every month is actually filled is counted: schedules are published 18 to 24 months ahead, and a half empty month would drag its average down.

Month by month

Daytime and night air temperatures, the temperature of the sea, and the average number of rainy days.

🟢 The sea column is ours. We computed it from 2,890 daily satellite measurements taken off Roatán between 2003 and 2026, credit NOAA Coral Reef Watch. Air and rain figures: World Weather Online, read 19 September 2026.

January

Coming from December, the sea loses 0.6 °C, and there is 1 fewer rainy day.

No storm on record since 1892.

February

February has the coolest sea of the year — and “coolest” means 26.7 °C (80 °F).

No storm on record since 1892.

March

March is the busiest month for cruise calls: about 7,432 passengers land on the island on an average day.

No storm on record since 1892.

April

April is the driest month of the year here — 2 rainy days on average — and the sunniest, with 287.8 hours.

No storm on record since 1892.

May

Coming from April, the sea gains 0.7 °C, sunshine drops by 16 hours, and there are 2 more rainy days.

No storm on record since 1892.

June

June is the windiest month of the year, averaging 45 km/h — the month when a boat trip is most likely to be called off.

4 storms recorded near the island in june since 1892.

July

Coming from June, sunshine rises by 22 hours, and there is 1 fewer rainy day.

4 storms recorded near the island in july since 1892.

August

Coming from July, the sea gains 0.5 °C, and there are 2 more rainy days.

3 storms recorded near the island in august since 1892.

September

September carries more storms than any other month: 15 of the 43 recorded near Roatán since 1892 came in september.

October

October is the wettest month of the year on Roatán: 15 rainy days on average, and the lowest sunshine after november.

14 storms recorded near the island in october since 1892.

November

November gets the least sunshine of the year: 117.8 hours, against 287.8 in april.

3 storms recorded near the island in november since 1892.

December

Coming from November, the sea loses 0.9 °C, sunshine rises by 40 hours, and there are 4 fewer rainy days.

No storm on record since 1892.

When wind cancels a boat trip

Wind, not rain, is what stops a day on the water. Rain passes. A sea that is up stays up, and it decides whether a boat goes out, whether snorkelling visibility is worth the trip, and how comfortable the crossing will be.

The windiest month of the year on Roatán is June, and two independent sources agree on that: our own thirty-year read of the ERA5 reanalysis, and timeanddate.com.

On how strong, they part ways: ERA5 gives a median of 26.8 km/h in June, and 36.3 km/h one day in ten; timeanddate reports 45 km/h (read 19 September 2026). The factor of 1.7 between them comes from measuring different things — timeanddate does not publish its method, so we stand on the one we know. The map below shows live gusts.

Live wind gusts around Roatán

Gusts, not average wind, are what a skipper looks at. Load this the morning of your trip: it is the one number that changes hour to hour.

🌊 Load the map

Loads on demand.

Weather map by Ventusky

Where the wind comes from, month by month

Each rose shows the 16 directions the wind blew FROM, over the 30 years of the climate normal. The longer the petal, the more often it blew from there.

And what the swell does

Median significant wave height per month, and the height reached one day in ten. Offshore: this is the swell that arrives, not the one that breaks.

The same figures, as a table

Month	From	Steadiness	Wind	Swell
January	ENE	0.62	21.4 km/h · 33 km/h one day in ten	1.11 m · ENE
February	ENE	0.73	23.2 km/h · 34.5 km/h one day in ten	1.12 m · ENE
March	ENE	0.75	24.3 km/h · 36.5 km/h one day in ten	1.13 m · ENE
April	E	0.82	25 km/h · 37 km/h one day in ten	1.11 m · ENE
May	E	0.78	24.2 km/h · 35.8 km/h one day in ten	1.02 m · ENE
June	E	0.83	26.8 km/h · 36.3 km/h one day in ten	1.13 m · E
July	E	0.93	25.7 km/h · 34.9 km/h one day in ten	1.02 m · E
August	E	0.83	22.3 km/h · 33 km/h one day in ten	0.88 m · ENE
September	E	0.65	17.3 km/h · 29.8 km/h one day in ten	0.76 m · ENE
October	no settled direction	0.34	16.3 km/h · 30.4 km/h one day in ten	0.8 m · NE
November	no settled direction	0.49	17.7 km/h · 30.9 km/h one day in ten	0.98 m · NE
December	ENE	0.57	17.9 km/h · 30 km/h one day in ten	1.02 m · NE

ERA5 does not see the island. Its grid cell is about 31 km across and Roatán sits inside one: the model sees open sea there. Read this as an OFFSHORE climate — it is not the wind on the dock at West End.

Genere a partir de la reanalyse ERA5 du Copernicus Climate Change Service (C3S) de l'ECMWF. Ni la Commission europeenne ni l'ECMWF ne repondent de l'usage qui est fait de cette donnee.

And how much it changes from one year to the next

Each bar covers the middle 80 % of the 30 years: the bad years are at the top, the calm ones at the bottom, the line is the typical year. This is the question you actually have — what if I get a bad one.

Why there is no trend line here

Thirty years let you compute a slope. They do not let you prove one: around here the year-to-year swing is driven largely by El Niño and by the Atlantic multidecadal oscillation, whose cycles are as long as the window itself.

And that is measured, not asserted: across the twelve months, the gap between a calm year and a rough one is 6.7 times the whole thirty-year drift for wind, and 4.2 times for swell. The drift is buried in the noise.

The same figures, as a table

Month	Calm year	Typical	Rough year	Span
January	19 km/h	22 km/h	24 km/h	5 km/h
February	21 km/h	23 km/h	26 km/h	5 km/h
March	21 km/h	25 km/h	27 km/h	5 km/h
April	21 km/h	25 km/h	28 km/h	7 km/h
May	17 km/h	25 km/h	29 km/h	12 km/h
June	21 km/h	26 km/h	30 km/h	9 km/h
July	22 km/h	26 km/h	28 km/h	6 km/h
August	18 km/h	22 km/h	26 km/h	8 km/h
September	13 km/h	17 km/h	22 km/h	9 km/h
October	13 km/h	16 km/h	21 km/h	8 km/h
November	14 km/h	17 km/h	21 km/h	7 km/h
December	14 km/h	18 km/h	21 km/h	7 km/h

Twice a year, your shadow disappears

Roatán sits at 16.3° north — inside the tropics. Twice a year the sun passes exactly overhead at noon, and a post stops casting a shadow. In 2026 that falls around May 5 and August 8.

The rest of the year it never gets low. At the December solstice the midday sun still stands 50.4° above the horizon here, against 25.9° in New York. That is the whole difference between a winter you endure and a winter you swim in.

And the day barely changes length: 116 minutes between the longest and the shortest of the year, 11.0 h against 13.0 h. Sunset never comes before 17:08 nor after 18:19. There is no “the days are drawing in” here.

Night falls all at once

Near the equator the sun drops almost vertically, so it crosses the horizon band fast. Civil twilight — the useful light after sunset — lasts 22 to 24 minutes here, against 33 minutes in New York at midsummer. Between “still light” and “can’t see a thing” you have about a third less time than you are used to. Plan the way back before it matters.

And where on the horizon it goes down

The sun does not set “in the west”. Over the year the point swings by about 49°, from WSW (245.7°) in December to WNW (294.4°) in June. That decides which beach gets the sunset, and when — worth knowing before you pick a room.

A time difference that moves without Roatán moving

Honduras never changes its clocks: UTC−6 all year. New York does. So the gap between you and the island is one hour in winter and two in summer — it shifts under your feet twice a year while your destination has done nothing.

And the UV index that goes with it

This is the one figure here that is not computed: the UV index comes from World Weather Online. It runs from 6 to 7 — twelve months, one point of spread. No winter dip, because the sun never goes low enough to give you one.

⚠️ But read it as a daily figure, not as noon. A sun standing 87° up cannot produce an index of 6 under a clear sky — at that height the midday value is far above it. Treat 7 as a floor, not a ceiling, and cover up in the middle of the day whatever the month says.

What that changes for you

• Sunburn. A sun overhead takes the shortest path through the atmosphere, so UV peaks — and the flat index above is the proof, not a coincidence.
• Snorkelling and diving. High sun drives light into the water. Reef colour is at its best roughly between 10 am and 2 pm — that is geometry, not an opinion.
• Photographs. In the tropics the sun sets almost vertically, so golden hour is short. Much shorter than you are used to further north.

Month by month

Month	Sun at noon	UV	Day length	Sunrise	Sunset	Twilight	Sets at
January	52.6°	6	11.1 h	06:21	17:30	23 min	WSW
February	61.1°	6	11.5 h	06:15	17:45	22 min	WSW
March	71.7°	7	11.9 h	05:57	17:53	22 min	W
April	83.6°	7	12.4 h	05:34	17:58	22 min	W
May	87.4°	6	12.8 h	05:19	18:06	23 min	WNW
June	83.0°	7	13.0 h	05:18	18:16	24 min	WNW
July	84.8°	6	12.9 h	05:26	18:19	23 min	WNW
August	87.7°	6	12.6 h	05:34	18:07	22 min	WNW
September	76.6°	6	12.1 h	05:38	17:45	22 min	W
October	65.1°	6	11.7 h	05:42	17:22	22 min	W
November	55.1°	6	11.2 h	05:53	17:08	23 min	WSW
December	50.4°	6	11.0 h	06:10	17:12	23 min	WSW

Computed from the date and latitude alone, with the NOAA solar equations — no outside source, nothing that goes stale. Sunrise and sunset are geometric (disc centre on the horizon, no refraction, no terrain): the real sunrise is a few minutes earlier. Honduras never changes its clocks — UTC−6 all year.

The moon, and why it matters here

Three things on Roatán run on the moon rather than on the calendar, and none of them is folklore.

• Bioluminescence. The plankton glow is drowned out by moonlight. The nights around a new moon are the dark ones, and they are the only ones worth going out for.
• Night dives. Same logic in reverse: a full moon lights the reef and changes what comes out. Neither is better — they are two different dives.
• Fishing. Several grouper and snapper species gather to spawn around the winter full moons. ⚠️ Those gatherings are exactly when some of them are protected — check before you plan a trip around one.

2026

• New moon Saturday, October 10, 2026 09:51
• Full moon Sunday, October 25, 2026 22:12
• New moon Monday, November 9, 2026 01:03
• Full moon Tuesday, November 24, 2026 08:54
• New moon Tuesday, December 8, 2026 18:53
• Full moon Wednesday, December 23, 2026 19:29

2027

• New moon Thursday, January 7, 2027 14:26
• Full moon Friday, January 22, 2027 06:18
• New moon Saturday, February 6, 2027 09:57
• Full moon Saturday, February 20, 2027 17:24
• New moon Monday, March 8, 2027 03:31
• Full moon Monday, March 22, 2027 04:45
• New moon Tuesday, April 6, 2027 17:52
• Full moon Tuesday, April 20, 2027 16:28
• New moon Thursday, May 6, 2027 05:00
• Full moon Thursday, May 20, 2027 05:00
• New moon Friday, June 4, 2027 13:41
• Full moon Friday, June 18, 2027 18:46
• New moon Saturday, July 3, 2027 21:03
• Full moon Sunday, July 18, 2027 09:46
• New moon Monday, August 2, 2027 04:06
• Full moon Tuesday, August 17, 2027 01:30
• New moon Tuesday, August 31, 2027 11:42
• Full moon Wednesday, September 15, 2027 17:05
• New moon Wednesday, September 29, 2027 20:37
• Full moon Friday, October 15, 2027 07:48
• New moon Friday, October 29, 2027 07:38
• Full moon Saturday, November 13, 2027 21:27
• New moon Saturday, November 27, 2027 21:25
• Full moon Monday, December 13, 2027 10:10
• New moon Monday, December 27, 2027 14:14

2028

• Full moon Tuesday, January 11, 2028 22:04
• New moon Wednesday, January 26, 2028 09:14
• Full moon Thursday, February 10, 2028 09:05
• New moon Friday, February 25, 2028 04:39
• Full moon Friday, March 10, 2028 19:07

Computed with the Meeus lunar algorithm, checked against a published new moon and correct to the minute. Times are Roatán local (UTC−6, no daylight saving). ⚠️ Computed on September 28, 2026, and the moon does not repeat yearly the way the sun does: if you are reading this well after that date, the first lines may already have passed.

What to do on Roatán when it rains

A shower is not a lost day here. It is a reason to move the day around rather than cancel it. What still works when the sky opens:

• Go inland. The island tours run in the rain, and the forest is at its best right after one.
• Go under. Diving and snorkelling are unaffected by rain itself — it is wind and swell that matter, not what falls from the sky.
• Take the beach club day. The private beach clubs have covered space, food and a roof, which a public beach does not.

When the sea is flattest

The water never gets cold here. It runs from 26.7 °C (80 °F) in february to 29.7 °C (85 °F) in september — a swing of only 3.0 °C across the whole year. Nobody skips a snorkelling day here because of water temperature.

The sea, year by year

Between 2003 and 2025, the sea off Roatán warmed by about 0.7 °C: 27.99 °C on average over 2003-2005, 28.69 °C over 2023-2025. That is 0.031 °C a year, measured from satellite, not projected. 23 years is not a climate in the WMO sense, which takes thirty: this is a bounded, dated measurement, not a forecast.

‹

20032004200520062007200820092010201120122013201420152016201720182019202020212022202320242025

›

2025: 28.58 °C on average, +0.38 °C against 2003-2025. Warmest in September (30.0 °C), coolest in January (27.4 °C).

Our own calculation from daily NOAA satellite measurements at 16.325 N / 86.525 W, one day in three. Only complete years are shown.

The flat-sea months line up with the dry months rather than with the warm ones: February, March, April, May combine the fewest rainy days of the year with the calmest conditions I see on the water.

But an average month does not tell you about tomorrow. Wave height is the single number that decides whether a boat leaves the dock, and the map below is the one I check before a departure.

Live wave height around Roatán

Significant wave height, updated continuously. Under about half a metre the crossing is comfortable for everyone; as it builds, the ride gets wet and some stops come off the itinerary. Switch to swell inside the map to see where the sea is coming from.

🌊 Load the map

Loads on demand.

Weather map by Ventusky

Measured against reality: on 19 September 2026 the NOAA buoys in the western Caribbean read 0.8 m and 1.5 m, and the wave models used by these maps were within 10 cm of both. Sources: NOAA NDBC buoys 42056 and 42057.

Where the swell comes from, and which shores escape it

Across the 360 months from 1991 to 2020, the dominant swell always came from somewhere between north and east: 351 months from northeast to east, 9 from north or north-northeast. Not a single month from the south or the west (0 out of 360). The north shore and the East End take it head on; the south shore and the West End sit out of the direct swell.

One month stands apart from all the others: October 1998, hurricane Mitch, with a rough-day swell (90th percentile) of 3.50 m. The next highest month tops out at 2.22 m (October 2005).

Offshore swell, on a 55 km grid (0.5°): the model sees neither the reef nor the shelter of the coast. It says where the sea comes from, not how it breaks on a given beach. "Out of the direct swell" is geometry, not a measurement.

The 360 months, one by one

One square per month, darker the more the swell came from the east. The circled square is the roughest month of the thirty years.

NNNENEENEE

The same figures, as a table

Month	Months per direction (30 years)	Typical	Rough day	Worst year
January	ENE 18 · NE 11 · E 1	1.11 m	1.74 m	2003: 2.15 m
February	ENE 26 · NE 3 · E 1	1.12 m	1.62 m	2016: 1.92 m
March	ENE 25 · E 3 · NE 2	1.13 m	1.74 m	1998: 2.05 m
April	ENE 23 · E 7	1.11 m	1.68 m	1998: 1.97 m
May	ENE 17 · E 13	1.02 m	1.55 m	2003: 1.84 m
June	E 27 · ENE 3	1.13 m	1.57 m	2019: 1.74 m
July	E 23 · ENE 7	1.02 m	1.42 m	1992: 1.67 m
August	E 15 · ENE 15	0.88 m	1.32 m	2007: 1.56 m
September	E 15 · ENE 14 · NE 1	0.76 m	1.20 m	2010: 1.37 m
October	ENE 15 · NE 10 · NNE 4 · N 1	0.80 m	1.36 m	1998: 3.50 m
November	NE 20 · ENE 7 · NNE 2 · N 1	0.98 m	1.65 m	1996: 2.19 m
December	NE 19 · ENE 10 · NNE 1	1.02 m	1.56 m	2018: 1.99 m

Genere a partir de la reanalyse ERA5 du Copernicus Climate Change Service (C3S) de l'ECMWF. Ni la Commission europeenne ni l'ECMWF ne repondent de l'usage qui est fait de cette donnee. Coastline: © OpenStreetMap contributors.

The tide: forget the month, check the day

Roatán has a small tide. Across a full year of NOAA predictions, the daily range averages 49 cm, and the month barely matters: from 46 cm in the quietest month to 52 cm in the strongest. Six centimetres apart.

What does change, and by a lot, is the day. The range runs from 16 cm to 80 cm depending on the moon — a factor of five. So there is no useful “best month for tides” on this island. There are good days and big days.

Half a metre decides nothing for a boat. It decides a great deal over the shallow reef: on a big low tide, the water above the coral gets thin, and a snorkeler who stands up or kicks down does real damage. If you are snorkelling the shallows, go on the rising tide, keep horizontal, and never stand on the reef.

Tide predictions for your dates, from the NOAA station on the island Station TEC5655 — Port Royal, Isla de Roatan, NOAA CO-OPS

What about hurricanes?

Short version: Roatán sits at the southern edge of the Caribbean hurricane belt and is hit far less often than people assume — but “less often” is not “never”, and 1998 is the reason nobody here jokes about it.

That question deserves numbers, not reassurance, and it has its own page with every storm recorded since 1892: hurricanes in Roatán, what 132 years of records actually say.

And here are the tracks themselves. Every line is a real storm recorded by NOAA; the list on the left tells you which. By default: the ones that came within 300 km of the island since 1966 — the year satellites began seeing them all.

Three questions this tool answers: has one already come close? in which month? and that one storm — where did it go?

Major hurricanesDecember to MayWhere did Mitch go?

Matching storms

Within 50 km100 km200 km300 km500 km Name or year

Month it passed All months

Strength measured At its closest pass At its strongest, anywhere ENSO phase Every phase El Niño Neutral La Niña Sort by Year, newestYear, oldestStrength hereDistance

MITCH was a category 5 — but a category 2 when it passed Roatán. This chooses which of the two every count uses.

El Niño years are quieter here: 0.40 storms a year against 2.14 in La Niña, over the satellite era.

Since

Before 1966, a storm that crossed no ship went unrecorded. The older the window, the more it under-counts.

Strength All

• Tropical storm or less Nadine 2024 123 km from Roatán · Oct 19, 2024
• Tropical storm or less Sara 2024 18 km from Roatán · Nov 16, 2024 wind on the island
• Category 1 Lisa 2022 91 km from Roatán · Nov 2, 2022 wind on the island
• Tropical storm or less Marco 2020 277 km from Roatán · Aug 21, 2020
• Tropical storm or less Nana 2020 83 km from Roatán · Sep 3, 2020
• Tropical storm or less Gamma 2020 281 km from Roatán · Oct 2, 2020
• Tropical storm or less Eta 2020 108 km from Roatán · Nov 6, 2020
• Tropical storm or less Iota 2020 278 km from Roatán · Nov 18, 2020
• Tropical storm or less Alberto 2018 266 km from Roatán · May 25, 2018
• Tropical storm or less Michael 2018 167 km from Roatán · Oct 6, 2018
• Tropical storm or less Franklin 2017 239 km from Roatán · Aug 7, 2017
• Tropical storm or less Harvey 2017 189 km from Roatán · Aug 22, 2017
• Tropical storm or less Nate 2017 195 km from Roatán · Oct 6, 2017
• Tropical storm or less Philippe 2017 282 km from Roatán · Oct 27, 2017
• Category 1 Earl 2016 118 km from Roatán · Aug 4, 2016 wind on the island
• Tropical storm or less Hanna 2014 29 km from Roatán · Oct 28, 2014
• Tropical storm or less Barry 2013 60 km from Roatán · Jun 17, 2013
• Category 1 Ernesto 2012 249 km from Roatán · Aug 7, 2012
• Tropical storm or less Helene 2012 132 km from Roatán · Aug 15, 2012
• Tropical storm or less Harvey 2011 60 km from Roatán · Aug 20, 2011
• Category 2 Rina 2011 197 km from Roatán · Oct 26, 2011
• Tropical storm or less Alex 2010 81 km from Roatán · Jun 26, 2010 wind on the island
• Tropical storm or less Karl 2010 225 km from Roatán · Sep 15, 2010
• Tropical storm or less Matthew 2010 72 km from Roatán · Sep 25, 2010 wind on the island
• Category 1 Paula 2010 197 km from Roatán · Oct 12, 2010
• Category 1 Richard 2010 61 km from Roatán · Oct 24, 2010 wind on the island
• Tropical storm or less Ida 2009 270 km from Roatán · Nov 7, 2009
• Tropical storm or less Arthur 2008 169 km from Roatán · May 31, 2008
• Tropical storm or less Sixteen 2008 149 km from Roatán · Oct 16, 2008
• Tropical storm or less Barry 2007 206 km from Roatán · May 31, 2007
• Category 5 Dean 2007 258 km from Roatán · Aug 21, 2007 wind on the island
• Tropical storm or less Felix 2007 121 km from Roatán · Sep 5, 2007
• Tropical storm or less Arlene 2005 278 km from Roatán · Jun 8, 2005
• Tropical storm or less Cindy 2005 223 km from Roatán · Jul 3, 2005
• Category 4 Wilma 2005 263 km from Roatán · Oct 20, 2005
• Tropical storm or less Gamma 2005 102 km from Roatán · Nov 19, 2005 wind on the island
• Tropical storm or less Chantal 2001 166 km from Roatán · Aug 20, 2001
• Tropical storm or less — 2001 251 km from Roatán · Sep 20, 2001
• Category 4 Iris 2001 79 km from Roatán · Oct 8, 2001
• Category 1 Keith 2000 178 km from Roatán · Sep 30, 2000
• Tropical storm or less Katrina 1999 34 km from Roatán · Oct 31, 1999
• Category 2 Mitch 1998 79 km from Roatán · Oct 29, 1998
• Tropical storm or less Dolly 1996 291 km from Roatán · Aug 20, 1996
• Tropical storm or less Kyle 1996 90 km from Roatán · Oct 11, 1996
• Tropical storm or less Allison 1995 267 km from Roatán · Jun 3, 1995
• Tropical storm or less — 1994 38 km from Roatán · Sep 25, 1994
• Tropical storm or less Gert 1993 129 km from Roatán · Sep 17, 1993
• Tropical storm or less Diana 1990 221 km from Roatán · Aug 5, 1990
• Tropical storm or less Karen 1989 173 km from Roatán · Dec 2, 1989
• Tropical storm or less Keith 1988 273 km from Roatán · Nov 20, 1988
• Tropical storm or less — 1988 156 km from Roatán · Aug 24, 1988
• Tropical storm or less — 1986 149 km from Roatán · Sep 1, 1986
• Tropical storm or less Hermine 1980 91 km from Roatán · Sep 22, 1980
• Tropical storm or less — 1980 13 km from Roatán · Oct 17, 1980
• Tropical storm or less — 1979 106 km from Roatán · Oct 12, 1979
• Category 3 Greta 1978 52 km from Roatán · Sep 18, 1978
• Tropical storm or less Frieda 1977 133 km from Roatán · Oct 18, 1977
• Tropical storm or less — 1975 189 km from Roatán · Sep 27, 1975
• Tropical storm or less — 1975 45 km from Roatán · Oct 29, 1975
• Tropical storm or less — 1975 154 km from Roatán · Nov 9, 1975
• Category 4 Carmen 1974 200 km from Roatán · Sep 2, 1974
• Category 2 Fifi 1974 23 km from Roatán · Sep 19, 1974
• Tropical storm or less — 1973 197 km from Roatán · Sep 6, 1973
• Tropical storm or less Chloe 1971 186 km from Roatán · Aug 24, 1971
• Category 1 Edith 1971 45 km from Roatán · Sep 10, 1971
• Tropical storm or less — 1971 218 km from Roatán · Oct 7, 1971
• Tropical storm or less Laura 1971 160 km from Roatán · Nov 20, 1971
• Tropical storm or less Ella 1970 226 km from Roatán · Sep 9, 1970
• Category 2 Francelia 1969 21 km from Roatán · Sep 2, 1969
• Tropical storm or less Laurie 1969 230 km from Roatán · Oct 17, 1969
• Tropical storm or less Abby 1968 134 km from Roatán · Jun 1, 1968
• Tropical storm or less — 1967 181 km from Roatán · Jun 10, 1967
• Tropical storm or less Alma 1966 184 km from Roatán · Jun 5, 1966

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Loading 2,004 storm tracks…

Colour shows the category at the storm’s closest pass to Roatán

• Tropical storm or less
• Category 1
• Category 2
• Category 3
• Category 4
• Category 5
• Roatán

Move over a track to identify it

Old counts are incomplete. Before satellites, a storm that crossed no ship went unrecorded, so the decades from 1851 to 1950 are under-counted. Comparing 1870 with 2020 on this map would compare the record, not the weather.

Open the tool full page — all 2,004 Atlantic storms since 1851, with every filter and the CSV export.

What this map leaves out: the nortes

NOAA’s record holds tropical cyclones only — no tropical waves, no cold fronts. Yet from November to March, cold North American air spills across the Gulf of Mexico and reaches this far south. Hondurans call it a norte: a steady northerly that blows for two to four days and builds a swell on the island’s north shore.

Our own numbers carry its fingerprint. January is both the coolest month of the year (25 °C average) and by far the wettest of the dry half: 144.7 mm across 8 rainy days, against 45.4 mm across 3 days in March. That is not the rainy season — that is the nortes.

So “not one storm from December to May” is accurate, and it does not mean “dead calm”. It means no tropical cyclone. Winter here runs on a wind regime of its own, one that carries no hurricane name and appears on no map on this page. The practical consequence follows by itself: a trip called off in January cannot be down to a hurricane — there has never been a single one — but a norte will do it.

Which month storms actually pass Roatán

In 43 recorded approaches since 1892, not one came in January, February, March, April, May and December.

• J January : 0 storms 0
• F February : 0 storms 0
• M March : 0 storms 0
• A April : 0 storms 0
• M May : 0 storms 0
• J June : 4 storms 4
• J July : 4 storms, 3 as hurricanes 4
• A August : 3 storms 3
• S September : 15 storms, 6 as hurricanes 15
• O October : 14 storms, 5 as hurricanes 14
• N November : 3 storms, 1 as a hurricane 3
• D December : 0 storms 0

storms recorded within 100 km of the island, by month

September and October account for 29 of the 43, or 67%.

A month with no storm on record since 1892 is not a month where nothing can happen. It is a month where nothing has. We keep the distinction, because a record is not a guarantee.

El Niño and hurricanes on Roatán

Every storm that has passed within 100 km of Roatán since 1950, sorted by the ENSO phase of its hurricane season. We computed this ourselves from two public NOAA datasets.

Right now: El Niño ONI index +1.8 (JJA 2026)

What is El Niño, and why does a Pacific index matter here?

El Niño is a periodic warming of the central Pacific Ocean. NOAA measures it with the ONI — the Oceanic Niño Index — which is simply how far that patch of ocean sits above or below its own long-term average, in degrees Celsius, over a three-month window. “JJA” means June-July-August.

The official threshold is +0.5 °C for El Niño and −0.5 °C for La Niña. Anything in between is called neutral. Today's reading of +1.8 is 3.6 times that threshold.

A warm Pacific changes the winds high above the Atlantic, increasing the shear that tears young storms apart before they organise. That is the accepted explanation for why El Niño years are quieter here. Our own count, above, is a correlation measured on 75 years of records — it agrees with the explanation, it does not prove it.

• El Niño current phase 0.05 1 / 20 years
• Neutral 0.32 12 / 38 years
• La Niña 0.67 12 / 18 years

storms per year

In 20 El Niño years, one single storm came near the island. In 18 La Niña years, twelve did.

Honest caveat: 25 events is a small sample. But the result holds up to testing — we expected 6.6 storms in El Niño years and counted 1 (probability 0.0105), and the neutral phase lands exactly on expectation (0.519), which is the control. This is a strong indication, not a forecast for any given year.

Sources: NOAA Climate Prediction Center (ONI) and NOAA HURDAT2. Read 2026-09-19.

Frequently asked questions

The same questions come back every week, so here are the short answers with the figures attached. Ask me anything that is not here — I answer these myself.

When is the rainy season on Roatán?

The wet months on Roatán are August, September, October, November, December. October counts the most rainy days of the year (15), and November receives the most water (207.3 mm). The island receives 1059.2 mm over a full year. Figures: World Weather Online and timeanddate.com, read on 19 September 2026.

Does Roatán have a dry season?

Yes, and the gap is large. April averages 2 rainy days and March 3, against 15 in October. That is roughly 8 times more rainy days. Some travel pages state that Roatán has no dry season; the month-by-month figures do not support that. Source: World Weather Online, read on 19 September 2026.

What is the best month to visit Roatán?

If you are choosing on weather alone, April and March are the driest months of the year, with 2 and 3 rainy days on average, and daytime temperatures around 28 °C / 82 °F. Air temperature is not the deciding factor here: it moves by about 3 °C across the whole year.

Does it rain all day on Roatán?

Usually not. Tropical rain here tends to arrive as a shower and pass, rather than settle in for the day. That is why a rainy-day count is more useful than a millimetre total: even October, the wettest month by that count, averages 15 rainy days out of 31.

How warm is the water in Roatán?

The sea off Roatán averages 26.7 °C (80 °F) in February, its coolest month, and 29.7 °C (85 °F) in September, its warmest. It never drops below swimming temperature. We computed these averages ourselves from 2890 daily satellite measurements taken between 2003 and 2026, credit NOAA Coral Reef Watch.

How hot does Roatán get?

The warmest month is September at about 29 °C (84 °F) on average, the coolest is January at about 25 °C (77 °F). The whole year fits inside roughly four degrees. Source: timeanddate.com, read on 19 September 2026.

What is the weather like in Roatán in January?

In January, Roatán averages 26 °C (79 °F) by day and 24 °C (75 °F) at night, with the sea at 26.9 °C (80 °F). Expect about 8 rainy days and 165.3 hours of sunshine over 23 sunny days. Sea temperature computed from 2,890 NOAA satellite measurements; air and rain from World Weather Online.

What is the weather like in Roatán in December?

In December, Roatán averages 26 °C (79 °F) by day and 25 °C (77 °F) at night, with the sea at 27.5 °C (82 °F). Expect about 9 rainy days and 157.5 hours of sunshine over 22 sunny days. Sea temperature computed from 2,890 NOAA satellite measurements; air and rain from World Weather Online.

What is the weather like in Roatán in February?

In February, Roatán averages 26 °C (79 °F) by day and 24 °C (75 °F) at night, with the sea at 26.7 °C (80 °F). Expect about 5 rainy days and 197.8 hours of sunshine over 24 sunny days. Sea temperature computed from 2,890 NOAA satellite measurements; air and rain from World Weather Online.

What is the weather like in Roatán in November?

In November, Roatán averages 27 °C (81 °F) by day and 25 °C (77 °F) at night, with the sea at 28.4 °C (83 °F). Expect about 13 rainy days and 117.8 hours of sunshine over 17 sunny days. Sea temperature computed from 2,890 NOAA satellite measurements; air and rain from World Weather Online.