Month by month
Bali in November
The hottest month of the year, the cheapest before the Christmas peak, and the one whose average tells you least.
November averages 151mm. In thirty years of record it has delivered as little as 34mm and as much as 463mm, which makes the average the least useful number on this page.
This is the month the monsoon turns, and the date it turns moves by weeks from one year to the next. That single fact runs through everything else: November is the hottest month at 31.6°C, the last cheap month before the Christmas peak, and the only month besides April where the record contains both a dry-season month and one wetter than the wettest.
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What November actually measures
On the chart November is the step up: roughly double October, a little over half of December. It is the shape of a season changing rather than a season.
Rainfall
151 mm
On average. An independent check at the same point puts it at 134mm.
Range, 30 years
34 to 463 mm
The widest spread relative to its own average of any month here.
Daytime high
31.6°C
The hottest month of the year, with the warmest nights at 25.0°C.
One caveat specific to this page. The average has two independent sources behind it and they agree; the 34 to 463mm range does not, because the check we use publishes a climatology rather than a year-by-year series. The range is the ERA5 record alone. As on the other month pages there is also no count of rainy days and no separate figure for Ubud, Munduk or the east coast, for the reasons set out with the data.
The month the average lies about
Every guide gives November a single figure and a verdict built on it. Look at what the thirty individual Novembers actually did. The driest of them delivered 34mm, which is less than an average August, the driest month of the Bali year. The wettest delivered 463mm, which is more than an average January, the wettest. Both of those were Novembers, in the same record, at the same place.
Only April does the same thing, and it does it less extremely. That is not a coincidence: those are the two months when the monsoon changes direction, and a transition is exactly where an average stops describing anything. In a wet-season month you know roughly what you are getting. In November you are being told the midpoint between two very different holidays.
There is one part of November that is predictable, and it points the other way from April's. Averaged over the same thirty years the first fortnight of November delivers 4.27mm of rain a day and the second 5.8mm, a rise of about 36 per cent, which is the largest within-month increase of any month in the year. April does the reverse and by the largest margin in the other direction. So if you are choosing between the two shoulder months, take early November or late April: those are the two driest fortnights the transition offers, and the monthly averages will not tell you that. October does the same thing one month earlier, and states the rule for all three.
What to do about it is unusually concrete. Do not build a November itinerary that needs specific weather on specific days: no single-shot sunrise trek, no island day pinned to the end of the trip, no plan whose whole point is one clear afternoon. Build one that works wet and is a bonus dry, book accommodation you would be happy indoors in, and keep the expensive weather-dependent things loose enough to move. Done that way, November is the best-value month in the calendar. Done as though the average were a forecast, it is the month most likely to disappoint.
It is also the hottest month
November tops the year at 31.6°C by day, and its nights at 25.0°C are the warmest Bali gets, shared with December. That surprises people, because the intuition is that the peak-season middle of the year is the hot part. It is not: the coolest month is August, in the middle of high season.
The honest size of this is 2.4°C across the whole year, which nobody feels as heat. What is felt is the combination: the year's highest temperatures arriving with rising humidity as the wet season sets in. That is the muggiest Bali gets, and it is worth knowing if you sleep badly in warm air or are travelling with very young children. The highlands around Ubud, Munduk and Kintamani are several degrees cooler than these coastal figures in every month, November included.
Where to base yourself in November
Base for the wetter November rather than the drier one, because that is the way the error costs less. A dry November spent in Sanur or Jimbaran is still a good holiday. A wet November spent in Munduk waiting for a view is not.
Sanur is the safest single base for the same reason it wins in the wet season: the reef keeps the water swimmable when the west coast is churned up, and the flat seafront path gives you something to do between showers. The Bukit and Canggu are still good in early November while the trades hold, and less so as the month goes on. Ubud works in either version of the month, which is worth something when you cannot predict which you will get.
All twelve bases, with what the airport transfer costs to each, are on our where to stay in Bali page.
What November is good for
Value, and space. November sits after the dry-season crowds have gone and before the Christmas rush arrives, which makes it one of the two genuinely quiet windows in the Bali year, the other being mid-January to early February. The difference is that November has a real chance of dry-season weather and January does not. That is the whole case for the month.
It is also when the island starts to green up again. The rice terraces and the waterfalls that are at their thinnest in August begin to recover as the rain returns, without yet reaching the saturated green of January. And because it is the changeover for the surf, an early-November trip can still find the Bukit working; our surfing guide has the seasonal switch in full.
For how November sits against the other eleven months on crowds as well as rain, see when to visit, and our weather guide for the pattern across the year.
Every month of the Bali year, with its measured rainfall and what the average hides, is on Bali month by month.
Bali in November: common questions
What is the weather like in Bali in November?+
November averages 151mm in the southern lowlands, roughly double October's 68mm and a little over half of December's 257mm. It is the month the monsoon turns. The average is the least useful number on this page, though: across thirty years of record November has run from 34mm to 463mm, so it has been both drier than an average August and wetter than an average January. Daytime highs are 31.6C, the hottest of the year.
Is November a good time to visit Bali?+
It is the best-value month with a real chance of dry-season weather, and it is a gamble. The dry season has officially ended and the Christmas peak has not begun, so prices and crowds are low, but which November you get is genuinely unpredictable. If your trip must have reliable sun, book a dry-season month. If you can take the risk in exchange for an empty island at a lower price, November pays better than any other month for it.
Has the rainy season started in Bali by November?+
Usually, but not always, and that is the point. November is the handover month between the dry season and the wet, and the date the monsoon actually arrives moves by weeks from one year to the next. In the thirty-year record the driest November delivered 34mm, less than an average August, and the wettest delivered 463mm, more than an average January. Both are Novembers.
Is November the hottest month in Bali?+
Yes, at 31.6C by day, with nights at 25C that are the warmest of the year alongside December's. It is a reliably surprising fact, because the hottest month sits in the wet season rather than in the high-season middle of the year. The whole year moves only 2.4C between its hottest and coolest month, so this changes what you pack far less than it changes what you assume.
Should you book Bali for November or December?+
November is drier on average, cheaper and quieter; December brings 257mm and, in its last ten days, the busiest and most expensive period of the Bali year. If you want the wet season without the Christmas peak, November is the better of the two by a clear margin. The trade is certainty: December's rain is more predictable than November's.
Can you surf in Bali in November?+
It is the changeover. From about November the winds swing round, the west-coast reefs of the Bukit start to turn messy, and the east coast begins to work, so an early-November trip can still catch the Bukit and a late-November trip probably will not. Like everything else in this month, the date it flips moves from year to year.
Are the fast boats to Nusa Penida running in November?+
Usually, but treat them as less reliable than in the dry season. The crossings from Sanur are cancelled when the sea is rough, and November is when rough days start reappearing. Put an island day in the middle of the trip rather than at the end, and do not book a flight home for the evening of one.