Is Tampa Hotter Than Miami?

Both Tampa and Miami are some of the most popular cities in Florida, both for tourists as well as people who wish to relocate to the Sunshine State. But which city has warmer weather? Is Tampa hotter than Miami?

In this article I’m going to answer this question by comparing the climate of these two cities.

Is Tampa Hotter Than Miami Year Round?

The average temperature in Tampa is 74.55 °F. In Miami, that temperature is 77.45 °F. So in general, Tampa is not hotter than Miami. In fact, it’s on average 3 degrees cooler.

Tampa is also cooler than slightly cooler parts of the Miami metropolitan area such as Miami Beach or cities further north like West Palm Beach (the average temperature there is 76.05 °F).

Other cities in the Tampa Bay area like St. Petersburg or Clearwater are cooler than Tampa. For St. Petesburg, the yearly daily mean temperature is 74.15 °F. For Clearwater, it’s 72.6 °F.

South Florida in general features a more tropical climate than Tampa. The Miami climate is one of the hottest in the entire United States.

Is Tampa Hotter Than Miami in the Winter?

If Tampa isn’t hotter year round than Miami, then maybe at least it’s warmer during the winter?

According to climate data, while Tampa enjoys warm high temperatures between 71-74 °F during the coldest months, Miami is much warmer with average high temperatures of 76-78 °F. So Tampa is up to 5 °F cooler in the winter than Miami.

Winter nights in Tampa are even colder. The average minimum temperature drops to 53-56 °F compared to much warmer 61-64 °F in Miami.

So yet again, the weather differences are quite noticeable, with a more favorable climate in Miami.

Is Tampa Hotter Than Miami in the Summer?

And how about the summer? Here Tampa wins—if you actually want even hotter summers than they already are in general in Florida.

The average temperature typically varies between 90.5 to 91.2 °F. In Miami, temperatures are between 89.3 and 90.7 °F. The differences aren’t thus that big but Tampa is a touch warmer than Miami during the day in the summer nonetheless.

Moreover, any Gulf breezes that reach the city don’t cool it off as much as the Atlantic Ocean does Miami. So you have both higher temperatures as well as less natural cooling.

Miami is sunnier than Tampa in the summer, though, and that may have a small impact on how hot it feels. You have fewer hours during which you can cool off in cloudy weather.

Miami has hotter summer nights than Tampa, though, with average low temperatures between 76.3 °F and 77.7 °F while in Tampa they’re between 75.4 °F and 76.8 °F. This also gives Miami more humidity as the dew point temperature is higher.

Overall, choose Miami if you want the most consistent hot weather. For more variety, choose Tampa.

If you’re interested in the warmest cities in Florida, check out my article in which I rank the 10 warmest cities in the state and also list 100 major cities by their average temperature.