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Photo by King of Hearts, CC BY-SA 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons.
Shanghai in January
ok · worth considering · the coolest month of the year
The year in Shanghai
Tap a month for its page
- JanJShanghai in January: ok
- FebFShanghai in February: ok
- MarMShanghai in March: good
- AprAShanghai in April: sweet spot
- MayMShanghai in May: sweet spot
- JunJShanghai in June: sweet spot
- JulJShanghai in July: ok, busy
- AugAShanghai in August: sweet spot
- SepSShanghai in September: good
- OctOShanghai in October: ok, busy
- NovNShanghai in November: sweet spot
- DecDShanghai in December: ok
- Sweet spot
- Good
- OK
- Avoid
- Busy
Plan this trip
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Flights
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Where to stay
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Luxury
Things to do
Car hire
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Travel insurance
Check whether your bank card or home insurance already covers this trip.
If the trip needs a visa, the travel agent or visa centre usually sells the cover it asks for.
Mobile data (eSIM)
Your own plan's EU roaming may already cover this.
Renting a pocket Wi-Fi is the other common way to stay connected.
These are sites people in book with. Each opens in a new tab, on the site's own pages.
The numbers
| Daily high | 10°C |
|---|---|
| Nightly low | 2°C |
| Feels like, afternoon | 6°C |
| Rainy days, 1 mm or more | 6 · 60 mm |
| Humidity | 74% |
| Sunshine | 6.1 h/day |
| Daylight | 10.4 h/day |
| Crowds | 80 / 100, higher is quieter |
Ten-year averages for this calendar month. A rainy day is one with at least 1 mm of rain, as a weather station counts it. The model these figures come from drizzles more than a rain gauge, the more so the warmer the month, so its days count from 2 mm, rising to 5 mm in the hottest.
Weather read at the Bund, 32 km from the airport (PVG): ten years of ERA5 and ERA5-Land reanalysis, through Open-Meteo's open data.
How busy it gets
Public holidays in January
- New Year's Day 1 Jan 2027
- New Year's Day (observed) 3 Jan 2028
- Chinese New Year's Eve 25 Jan 2028
- Chinese New Year (Spring Festival) 26 Jan 2028
Holidays crowd a place out and push fares up around them; they count toward the crowd score above.
Shanghai in pictures
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Ermell, CC BY-SA 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons
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Denys Nevozhai dnevozhai, CC0, via Wikimedia Commons
What to pack
- A proper coat, hat and gloves: nights average 2°C.
- A packable rain jacket for the 6 or so rainy days.
Each line is a threshold over the ten-year figures above, not advice from anywhere else.
Before you go
Type A and C and I plugs at 220 V. Drives on the right. The currency is the Renminbi. No UK Foreign Office advice against travel. Global Affairs Canada: Exercise a high degree of caution (with regional advisories). US State Department: Level 2: Exercise Increased Caution. Everything for China: cost of living, languages, emergency numbers and health.
On arrival in Shanghai: the apps, paying, getting around, tipping and the emergency numbers.
January elsewhere
In January from
The other months at Shanghai
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