Milwaukee has a

humid continental climate A humid continental climate is a climatic region defined by Russo-German climatologist Wladimir Köppen in 1900, typified by four distinct seasons and large seasonal temperature differences, with warm to hot (and often humid) summers and freezing ...

(

Köppen climate classification The Köppen climate classification is one of the most widely used climate classification systems. It was first published by German-Russian climatologist Wladimir Köppen (1846–1940) in 1884, with several later modifications by Köppen, notabl ...

''Dfa''), with four distinct

season A season is a division of the year based on changes in weather, ecology, and the number of daylight hours in a given region. On Earth, seasons are the result of the axial parallelism of Earth's tilted orbit around the Sun. In temperate and ...

s and wide variations in

temperature Temperature is a physical quantity that expresses quantitatively the perceptions of hotness and coldness. Temperature is measurement, measured with a thermometer. Thermometers are calibrated in various Conversion of units of temperature, temp ...

and

precipitation In meteorology, precipitation is any product of the condensation of atmospheric water vapor that falls under gravitational pull from clouds. The main forms of precipitation include drizzle, rain, sleet, snow, ice pellets, graupel and hail. ...

in short periods of time. The city's climate is also strongly influenced by nearby Lake Michigan, which creates two varying climates within the

Milwaukee Milwaukee ( ), officially the City of Milwaukee, is both the most populous and most densely populated city in the U.S. state of Wisconsin and the county seat of Milwaukee County. With a population of 577,222 at the 2020 census, Milwaukee ...

area. The

Urban heat island effect An urban heat island (UHI) is an urban area, urban or metropolitan area that is significantly warmer than its surrounding rural areas due to human impact on the environment, human activities. The temperature difference is usually larger at nigh ...

also plays a role in the city's climate, insulating it from winter cold, but keeping it cooler in spring and summer.

Monthly normals and record temperatures

Temperatures

Milwaukee has a continental climate with wide variations in temperatures over short periods, especially in spring and autumn. The warmest month is July, when the average high temperature is 81 °F (27 °C), and the overnight low is 63 °F (17 °C).Average and record temperatures and precipitation, Milwaukee, Wisconsin, The Weather Channel

/ref> The coldest month is January, when the average high temperature is only 28 °F (-2 °C). Low temperatures in January average 16°F (-8°C). The highest temperature ever recorded in Milwaukee is 105 °F (41 °C) on July 24, 1935 and the coldest temperature is -26 °F (-32 °C), on both January 17, 1982 and February 4, 1996. The former occasion is referred to as " Cold Sunday", because of the extreme cold felt in many locations in the United States on that day.

Precipitation

Milwaukee has varied precipitation throughout the year, in both type and amount. Although

rain Rain is water droplets that have condensed from atmospheric water vapor and then fall under gravity. Rain is a major component of the water cycle and is responsible for depositing most of the fresh water on the Earth. It provides water ...

can fall all year round, it is rare during winter months.

Snow Snow comprises individual ice crystals that grow while suspended in the atmosphere—usually within clouds—and then fall, accumulating on the ground where they undergo further changes. It consists of frozen crystalline water throughout ...

falls from late November until early March, although snow can fall as early as late September or as late as the end of May. During the transition into and out of winter, various mixed forms of precipitation can occur, such as sleet,

ice Ice is water frozen into a solid state, typically forming at or below temperatures of 0 degrees Celsius or Depending on the presence of impurities such as particles of soil or bubbles of air, it can appear transparent or a more or less opaqu ...

, and

freezing rain Freezing rain is rain maintained at temperatures below freezing by the ambient air mass that causes freezing on contact with surfaces. Unlike a mixture of rain and snow or ice pellets, freezing rain is made entirely of liquid droplets. The rain ...

. Ice storms are uncommon. These types of precipitation tend to occur mainly in November and March. An average year in Milwaukee sees 34.81 inches (884.2 mm) of precipitation, with a yearly average snowfall of 52.4 inches (133 cm).Average annual precipitation by month at selected locations, NOAAbr>
The city receives more snowfall than cities even slightly inland because of lake-effect snow produced by Lake Michigan. As Milwaukee lies on the western shore of Lake Michigan, east winds, although not the prevailing wind direction in the Midwest, occur when

panhandle hook A panhandle hook (also called a pan handle hook or Texas hooker) is a relatively infrequent winter storm system whose cyclogenesis occurs in the South to southwestern United States from the late fall through winter and into the early Spring (seaso ...

systems move northeast bringing heavier snowfall on the Milwaukee side of the lake. Milwaukee receives far less snow than cities on the eastern shore of the lake, which receive extra snowfall when more common west or north-west winds blow. The wettest month of the year is August, with an average 4.03 inches (102 mm) of precipitation, mainly as rainfall. Long-duration rains are uncommon in summer, usually occurring only in April or October. Thunderstorms are the main precipitation events from May until September, and Milwaukee experiences an extended

tornado season Tornadoes have been recorded on all continents except Antarctica. They are most common in the middle latitudes where conditions are often favorable for convective storm development. The United States has the most tornadoes of any country, as we ...

that lasts from late March until early June, however, severe weather and tornadoes are more frequent inland to the west. The driest month is February, when only 1.65 inches (41.9 mm) of precipitation falls, almost entirely as light, low moisture content snow resulting from the Alberta clipper type system when cold, dry air masses dominate.

Notes

References

{{ClimateUS Milwaukee Milwaukee metropolitan area

Climate of Wisconsin

Monthly normals and record temperatures

Temperatures

Precipitation

Notes

See also

References