Taking in consideration the prices, weather, and activities to decide the best season for you trip.
As our full guide of activities will show you, many visits are indeed better between June and September for the outdoor as you get less rain and better temperature as seen in our charts here. However if you want to save in the hotels and flight costs, the best time is between January and March as there is less demand during winter.
Somethings to consider is the number of hours of daylight as in summer you can enjoy the city up to 10.30PM while in winter around 5PM it is already dark. If you want to focus on museums visits it is actually better in winter as you will get less crowds and queues.
If you want a middle ground between nice weather and price you can come in September, October, November to experience the beautiful color of Autumns with an weather that is still hot enough not to be frozen and cheaper prices than summer. By opposition winter is not that nice for nature lovers as the trees will be without their nice green leaves.
To conclude :
- January is good for the winter sales and cheap for accomodation but a bit ugly for the nature.
- February in Paris could be good for Valentine’s Day and the famous vintage cars exhibition Retromobile.
- March is getting a bit greener but still not that nice.
- April is starting to get warmer and much greener and you can enjoy the Foire de Paris huge retail market and the day are getting longuer.
- May is very interesting as it is getting warmer, greener and you can get to see many museum for free during the European Night of Museums around the 14th.
- June is really the sweet spot before summer for warmer temperatures but less tourists. The daylight last till almost 11pm and you can go the the Music Day the 21th or the LGBTQ Pride Paris the 25th. The city start to party much more and get this special summer vibe.
- July is the peak and you can enjoy the city with the best weather but more queues everywhere. Also you can access Paris Plage for free from around 10th July till 20th August approx, a must to do in summer.
- August is nice if there is no heatwave. You can enjoy the city and many concerts and small shows everywhere. Also at the end of August their is the Rock en Seine music festival to to miss.
- September is the month we would advise anyone to go as the french schools reopen and all the french go back to work. Less people at Disneyland and the weather is still amazing without being to warm. Price drops a lot too making the holidays in Paris cheap. Also the European Heritage Days will allow to enter for free in most museums in mid-september. For the music fans their is the Techno Parade usually the 3rd week of September.
- October is beautiful to observe the fall multicolor leaves in Paris. Temperatures and prices drop sharply! You can enjoy the Nuit Blanche event the first weekend of October.
- November is the month we would stay away from as nothing special happen, it is cold, getting less green.
- December is a nice time to go for Christmas celebrations. The city will lit up and you can stroll around the Printemps Haussmann shops world famous Christmas decorations. The prices are a bit higher due to the tourists coming for to celebrate the new years eve too.
