1. Cape Town — South Africa
Score 100.0Day27.4 °CNight17.0 °CRainy days3
Where to go in January
January is the month when the ranking leaves Europe almost entirely. Ten places share the ceiling and not one of them is European; Tenerife follows at 99.7 and is the only name from the continent in sight. The belt that carries the month starts at the southern tip of Africa — Cape Town at 27.4 °C, Stellenbosch beside it — and runs through Dakar, Cape Verde and the Red Sea to the Gulf and Wadi Rum. It is high summer below the equator and dry season above it, and the table simply follows. Read the score for what it is: a comfort filter built on the afternoon high, the count of days above 1 mm and the night-time low. It knows nothing about flying time, and January's leaders are won on long-haul rather than on a weekend hop. Against that, the European cities everyone is fleeing have never been quieter or cheaper, ski resorts excepted.
The ranking for January
2. Stellenbosch — South Africa
Score 100.0Day27.4 °CNight17.0 °CRainy days3
3. Sal — Cape Verde
Score 100.0Day26.0 °CNight20.4 °CRainy days0
4. Sharm El Sheikh — Egypt
Score 100.0Day23.4 °CNight16.3 °CRainy days0
5. Abu Dhabi — United Arab Emirates
Score 100.0Day24.7 °CNight17.5 °CRainy days2
6. Dubai — United Arab Emirates
Score 100.0Day25.5 °CNight17.1 °CRainy days1
7. Ras Al Khaimah — United Arab Emirates
Score 100.0Day25.4 °CNight13.2 °CRainy days2
Three of them in detail
Cape Town — South Africa
Cape Town holds 27.4 °C in the afternoon and 17 °C before dawn, with three days above 1 mm and 40 mm of rain — one of the drier months of a year that counts 78 rainy days in all. It is an inexpensive base by European standards, 381 on an index where France stands at 1,000, and the airport is 17 km from town.
Sharm El Sheikh — Egypt
Sharm El Sheikh offers 23.4 °C by day and 16.3 °C at night, and rain there is a rounding error: 1.6 mm in January, 13.8 mm across the entire year. Diving weather rather than lounging weather, the water being cooler than in autumn. With an index of 183, no base here costs less.
Tenerife — Spain
Tenerife sits just under the ceiling in January at 99.7 with 21.9 °C by day, 16.2 °C at night and four rainy days. Its appeal lies in being stable: a rare place whose good season covers all twelve months. The north stays greener and cloudier than the southern resorts, and the northern airport is 9 km from La Laguna.
What to avoid this month
The list to avoid is entirely European this month, split between the soaked and the frozen. Reykjavik takes 18 days above 1 mm and 154.8 mm, the only one listed for rain. Oslo peaks at 0.4 °C, Bled at 0.7 °C with nights at −5.2 °C, Stockholm at 1.1 °C, Interlaken at 3.3 °C.
- Reykjaviktoo wet
- Bledtoo cold
- Stockholmtoo cold
- Oslotoo cold
- Interlakentoo cold
How the score is calculated
One formula, applied identically to the hundred places, on measured station records:
score = 100 − 3·max(0, |tMax − 25| − 3) − 4·max(0, rainyDays1 − 6) − 2·max(0, 12 − tMin)A place is flagged as one to avoid when it records 14 rainy days or more in the month, an average high of 34 °C or more, or an average high of 8 °C or less. Only the five lowest-scoring flagged places are listed.
Updated on 21 September 2026