June, July or August? Which is worse? Well…

In the UAE, the summer months tend to blend into one long sweaty blur.

There are ‘it’s too hot to have lunch outside’ months, and then there are ‘we can’t walk from our car to the office without having a mini meltdown’ days. At the moment it feels like we’re firmly entrenched in the latter period.

But which month is actually the hottest?

Well, the National Centre of Meteorology (NCM) has collected data at a weather station near Dubai International Airport for 49 years, from 1974 to 2023.

And the findings? Well, almost all of the temperature indicators peak in August, meaning overall that is the hottest month in Dubai.

It’s a minimal difference, but still, here is the 49 years of data broken down…

The mean temperature (over both daytime and night) is 33.4 degrees Celsius in June, 35.3 in July, 35.5 in August and then 33.1 degrees in September.

The max temperature at the Dubai weather station was 47.9 degrees Celsius in June, 48.5 in July, 48.8 in August and 46.1 in September.

The max mean humidity is 75% in June, 73% in July, 72% in August and 78% in September (which explains why September can often feel just as oppressive, heat wise, as super-hot August).

ALSO READ: What is the hottest temperature ever recorded in the UAE?

The hottest temperature recorded in the UAE

The NCMS take daily temperature recordings at their many weather stations across the UAE, and from these they discovered that the hottest temperature recorded in the UAE in July 2002, when the temperature was recorded at a toasty 52.1 degrees Celsius. Ouch.

Image: Getty