Dallas weather in October

Texans draw a hard line inside October. "Early October still way too hot," says one; the repeated recommendation is "late October / early November" instead, and someone at an outdoor wedding in the last week of October "didn't need any outerwear." So a trip dated the 5th and a trip dated the 28th are different seasons. The other correction is about what autumn means here: "fall in Texas does not involve trees changing colors or anything like that. Days are still warm, possibly hot, evenings usually cool." Anyone booking October for foliage is booking the wrong state and the wrong month. The consensus on the back half is warm: "October into November is some of our nicest weather." Our record has 26.4°C days, 16.1°C nights and only 7 rain days.

Regulars name a specific local phenomenon, the blue norther, as the real wildcard here - a cold front that can drop the temperature 40 Fahrenheit degrees within one to two hours, turning a mild 73-degree day into a 52-degree one by the next. Our row backs the average sitting between those extremes, 16.7C over 5.9C nights feeling 3C, with 71.3mm of rain across 4.7 days and a real 20.5 kph wind. Regulars are consistent the city can shut down if ice forms on the roads, though most winters see mild, non-freezing nights more often than ice storms. Checking the forecast a few days ahead is the standard advice, with a light jacket or hoodie usually enough outside of a genuine norther event. The record: humidity 69 percent, 6.6 hours of sun and AQI 36.

Regulars are direct that this is peak severe-weather season here, and the standard advice for any visitor is to learn how local warning systems work and take a weather alert seriously rather than treat it as background noise - this is also the region's most tornado-prone stretch of the year. Our row backs a warm, changeable month, 29.4C reading as a real 31C, over 19.3C nights, with a substantial 146.5mm of rain across 8.2 days, regulars' single wettest month by contrast with the drier late summer. By the end of the month, though, regulars describe genuinely hot, settled days in the mid-to-high 80s Fahrenheit with mild 60s nights, so a visit can land on either side of that severe-weather risk depending on the week. The record: humidity 72 percent, 9.9 hours of sun, a 21 kph wind and AQI 60.

November here starts warm and ends cool: regulars put the early weeks in the sixties and seventies, with people still in shorts and t-shirts by day and rarely needing more than a light jacket in the evening, and the cold arriving towards the end. Our row averages 20.4C over 9.3C. Their warning is the tail risk - the occasional ice storm around Thanksgiving - so the month can be very pleasant or briefly very nasty, and layers are the answer to both. Rain is light at 70.7mm across 4.7 days. The record: humidity 69 percent, 7.5 hours of sun, a 19.9 kph wind and AQI 38.

March is the least predictable month of the Dallas year by the forum's own reckoning, which is why the advice is to watch the forecast and pack things you can put on and take off - the local line being that if you do not like the weather you should wait an hour. Our row's 22.2C average high with 11C nights and a 23.7 kph wind is the calm version of that. Two March specifics come with it. Texas spring break falls in this month, which makes lodging harder and the attractions busier, and the Dallas Arboretum blooms in late March with half a million tulips. The month is also wet for the region at 103.6mm across 7 days. The record: 8.2 hours of sun, humidity 66 percent and AQI 45.