Month by month
Bali in January
The wettest month of the year at 284mm, and the one whose first week costs the most and delivers the least.
January is the wettest month in Bali, and its first week is the worst value in the island's year: peak-season prices for the year's heaviest rain.
The southern lowlands take 284mm across the month, more than any other and about 7.9 times what falls in August. Days reach 30.8°C and nights hold at 24.9°C. What makes January worth understanding rather than avoiding is that it contains both ends of the value scale within about ten days of each other, and almost nobody planning a trip notices the join.
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What January actually measures
January is the tallest bar on this chart, which is the whole reason the month has the reputation it has.
Rainfall
284 mm
The wettest month of the year. An independent check at the same point puts it at 317mm.
Daytime high
30.8°C
Not the hottest month. November is, at 31.6°C, and the year’s whole range is 2.4°C.
Night-time low
24.9°C
Warm and humid overnight, within a degree of every month between October and April.
There is no count of rainy days on this page, because the reanalysis and the airport station disagree by more than three times over and neither figure survives a check, and no separate rainfall figure for Ubud, Munduk or the east coast, because the models that claim to resolve them contradict each other. The highlands are wetter than the coast; we do not put a number on how much.
The worst-value week of the Bali year
Bali's two annual peaks are July to August and Christmas to New Year. The second of them does not end on the 31st of December. It runs into the first days of January, and those days sit inside the wettest month on the chart above. For roughly the first week of the year you are paying the highest rates Bali charges, in its heaviest rain, alongside the largest crowds it gets. There is no other week in the calendar where those three line up.
Then it breaks, and it breaks fast. Once the New Year travellers have flown home, the northern-hemisphere holidays are finished and the Australian school year has restarted, demand falls off a cliff into what is probably the emptiest stretch of the Bali year: roughly the second week of January to the start of February. The rain has not improved. Everything else has.
So the practical advice for January is unusually blunt. If your dates are fixed to the first week, know what you are buying and lower your expectations of the beach. If they are not, moving a January trip back by seven to ten days changes almost everything about it except the weather.
What the wettest month is actually like
Still not a wet fortnight in northern Europe. The wet-season shape holds in January: a warm and often bright morning, then a heavy downpour in the afternoon or evening that empties the sky and passes. What changes in January is the frequency and the tail. There are more of those downpours than in any other month, and the longer wet spells, the ones that take out most of a day, are at their most likely.
Plan mornings and leave afternoons soft, the same as any wet-season month, but in January also leave slack in the shape of the trip itself. Two things in particular are worth protecting. Fast boats to Nusa Penida and Nusa Lembongan do not run when the sea is rough, and rough seas are likelier now than at any point in the dry season, so an island day belongs in the middle of a trip and never the day before a flight. And a heavy downpour floods parts of the southern road network, which turns an hour's drive into two with no warning.
Our Bali weather guide covers the pattern across the year, and when to visit sets January against the other months for crowds as well as rain. December is the month either side of it and runs the same split in reverse.
Where to base yourself in January
The same tilt as December, only stronger. The highlands catch more cloud and rain than the lowlands in every month and the gap is widest now, so Munduk and Kintamani are January nights rather than January bases. A Batur sunrise trek in the wettest month is a coin toss on the view, and worth treating as one.
Sanur is the strongest January base for the same reason it works in December: the reef keeps the water calm and swimmable when the west coast is churned up, and the flat seafront gives you somewhere to walk between showers. Jimbaran holds a calm bay too and sits twenty minutes from the airport. Ubud is a fine January base if the trip is about the landscape rather than the sea, as long as you accept that it is wetter than the coast and start early.
The twelve bases compared, with what the airport transfer costs to each, are on our where to stay in Bali page.
What January is good for
Everything that the rain makes. The Tegallalang terraces and the valleys around Ubud are at their most saturated green, and the waterfalls that are a disappointing trickle in September are running hard. If your camera is the reason you are going, January is the month the island looks like the photographs.
It is also the month with the fewest people in it, once the first week has cleared. Temples that queue in August are quiet, the drive north takes the time the map claims, and the good restaurants have tables. That is a real and underrated version of Bali, and January is when it exists.
For surfers the seasonal switch is in full effect: the Bukit is unreliable and the east coast is working, so Keramas and the Nusa Lembongan reefs are where January sends you. Our surfing guide has the detail. And indoor Bali is genuinely good, which is not true of every wet destination: the spas, the cooking classes, the markets and the food do not care what the sky is doing.
Every month of the Bali year, with its measured rainfall and what the average hides, is on Bali month by month.
Bali in January: common questions
What is the weather like in Bali in January?+
January is the wettest month of Bali's year. The southern lowlands average 284mm, ahead of December's 257mm and about 7.9 times what falls in August. Daytime highs are 30.8C and nights 24.9C. The rain typically arrives as a heavy afternoon or evening downpour rather than as all-day drizzle, but January has more of those downpours and more of the longer wet spells than any other month.
Is January a bad time to visit Bali?+
It is the wettest month, so it is the weakest month for a beach-first trip, and the seas are at their roughest on the west coast. It is a good month for the landscape, for value from about the second week onwards, and for anyone who would rather see Bali without the crowds. The month it is genuinely wrong for is a surf trip to the Bukit, or a holiday whose whole plan is sunbathing.
When is the cheapest time to visit Bali?+
Mid-January to early February is the emptiest stretch of the Bali year. The Christmas and New Year peak breaks around the second or third of January, the northern-hemisphere holidays are over, the Australian school year restarts, and the wettest weather keeps demand down. That combination does not happen at any other point in the calendar.
How hot is Bali in January?+
About 30.8C by day and 24.9C at night in the south. It is not the hottest month; that is November at 31.6C, and the whole year's daytime range is only 2.4C. Heat is not what changes between Bali's months. Rain and crowds are, and January sits at one extreme of the first and, after its first week, at the other extreme of the second.
Can you still go to Nusa Penida in January?+
Yes, but build slack into the plan. The fast boats from Sanur are cancelled when the sea is rough, and rough seas are more likely in January than in any dry-season month. Do not put an island day on your last full day, and do not book a same-day return flight after one. Staying a night on the island rather than day-tripping also takes the pressure off a single crossing.
Is the surf good in Bali in January?+
On the east coast, yes. From November to March the winds swing round, the famous Bukit reefs turn messy and unreliable, and Keramas and the reefs off Nusa Lembongan come into their own. If you are coming specifically to surf Uluwatu or Padang Padang, January is the wrong month.
What should you pack for Bali in January?+
The same light, breathable clothes as any month, plus a genuine plan for getting wet: quick-drying fabrics, a dry bag for a phone and a camera, sandals with grip rather than flip-flops for wet stone steps, and something to keep a bag dry on a scooter. A light layer is worth having if you are going up to Ubud, Munduk or Kintamani, which are several degrees cooler than the coast in every month.