The timing of winter in Victoria

The winter season can have different meanings, and its exact timing tends to vary from place to place.  Astronomical winter is from the winter solstice (roughly December 21) to the spring equinox (roughly March 21).  Meteorological winter is from December 1 to February 28. 

In Victoria, our winter (the coolest, cloudiest, and rainiest time of year) tends to come early.  On average, the coldest temperatures occur in late December.  By contrast, in most locations in the eastern half of Canada, the coldest temperatures of the winter tend to be in late January - a full month later.  The chart below shows the average daily maximum temperature in Victoria for astronomical winter (the blue line is the daily maximum temperature and the red line is a moving average weekly temperature to smooth out the trend).  You can see that temperatures tend to steadily increase throughout the winter, from about 6.5 C in late December to 11.5 C in late March. 

Average daily maximum temperatures in Victoria during the winter

Other aspects of Victoria's winter also tend to come early.  The rainiest month in Victoria is November, followed by December and January.  As we progress through the winter, it tends to get less and less rainy.  Victoria is most likely to receive snow in December, but the chances of snow decline later in the winter, particularly as we get into February.  December is the cloudiest month in Victoria, but sunshine starts to increase in January, then really increases in February and March. 

It's nice that we get the worst part of our winter over with in November and December, then we can look forward to gradually improving conditions after that!