Dominican Republic Climate Patterns

The Dominican Republic is tropical and warm year round, but it has far more climatic variety than most Caribbean islands because it is large and mountainous.

The coasts

Coastal temperatures sit between 25 and 31°C throughout the year, moderated by trade winds. The difference between seasons is humidity and rain rather than heat.

Wet and dry

The drier stretch runs December to April; the wetter one from May to November, with rain usually arriving as heavy afternoon showers. The north coast is wetter than the south and has a second rainfall peak in winter, which catches people out — Puerto Plata and Samana can be damp in January while Punta Cana is dry.

The mountains

Altitude changes everything. Constanza and Jarabacoa, at 1,000 to 1,200 metres, are pleasantly cool, and the summit of Pico Duarte regularly drops below freezing, with frost recorded — a genuine surprise on a Caribbean island, and the reason a trek there needs proper cold-weather kit.

The dry south-west

Sheltered by the Sierra de Bahoruco, the area around Lago Enriquillo receives very little rain and is semi-desert, with cactus and scrub.

Choosing a coast

Because the rainfall pattern differs between the north and the south, the practical advice is to pick the coast to match the month rather than assume the island behaves as one. December to March favours the east and south — Punta Cana, Bayahibe, the capital — while the north coast and Samana are at their driest and clearest from roughly June to September, which is the opposite of the general Caribbean rule.

Hurricanes

The season runs June to November and peaks between August and October. Hispaniola is struck regularly and the mountains can wring enormous rainfall out of a passing storm, so flooding and landslides are often the greater danger.