The best time to visit United Arab Emirates

What a year in United Arab Emirates looks like

The Emirates does not really have four seasons; it has two halves that feel like different countries. From roughly November to March the air is mild enough to walk the old souks, sit by the water and sleep out in the desert without thinking twice. From June to September, heat combined with coastal humidity makes an afternoon in the open something residents themselves plan around rather than endure. October and April sit in between, still workable outdoors in the morning and evening, with the crowds of high season not yet at full strength.

The year, in windows

• November to December — The temperature drops back to a level where you can be outside all day, beach clubs reopen their terraces, and desert camps start filling on weekend nights. A run of international sporting fixtures and trade fairs lands in these weeks, so hotels in the central districts book out earlier than people expect. The last stretch of December is the busiest part of the whole season.
• January to February — For most visitors these are the best weeks of the year: warm by day, cool enough at night in the desert that you want a jacket. What rain the Emirates gets usually arrives in this window, as a handful of short bursts rather than a season, and when it does fall water pools on the roads quickly because the city was built for a desert. Outdoor markets, dhow cruises and dune drives are all at their most comfortable now.
• March to April — Heat returns in increments: mornings stay easy, afternoons start to require planning. The shamal winds that carry dust across the Gulf often blow in these weeks, turning the sky milky and cutting visibility for days at a stretch. It is the window chosen by people who want decent weather without the full weight of high season, and outdoor events shift steadily earlier in the day as April goes on.
• May to September — Summer on the Gulf coast is heat with humidity attached, which is harder on a body than the dry heat of the interior desert. Daily life relocates almost completely into malls, museums and air-conditioned walkways, and outdoor plans shrink to before eight in the morning and after sunset. People who come now are mostly here for work, for school holidays, or because they intend to spend the time indoors anyway. Hotel availability is at its easiest of the year, which is the honest trade.
• October — October is the month of the turn. The first half still feels like summer, while the second half lets you sit outside in the evening without regretting it. Desert camps and open-air venues reopen one by one, usually before the queues arrive. Anyone willing to accept a hot midday gets the cities in a noticeably quieter version than high season delivers.

The weeks to aim for

With a free choice, aim for mid-January to early March. That is when the weather is steadiest and you can walk an old souk, take a boat out and drive into the dunes in the same day without hiding from the sun. Travellers who handle heat well and would rather have easier rooms should look at late October or the second half of April, when mornings are still comfortably outdoors. If your dates fall in the fasting month, which moves through the calendar year by year, check that year's calendar first, because daytime opening hours and the feel of the streets are different.

The weeks to avoid

The weeks travellers most often regret are July to September, not because anything closes but because most of what people come to do happens outdoors, and outdoors in those months is something you push through rather than enjoy. If the dates are fixed, plan the trip as an indoor one from the start — museums, indoor pools, food halls — and treat early morning and after dark as your only outside hours. Rooms are far easier to get then, and that is the genuine trade you are making. Late December is the opposite problem: perfect weather, the heaviest crowds and the tightest availability of the year.

What the season does to a data plan

Summer changes data use here in a direct way: people spend far longer inside malls and cooled walkways, so much of the day rides on indoor Wi-Fi rather than the network. The catch is the walk across an open car park or the wait for a shuttle, when an overheated phone dims itself and throttles to cool down, exactly while you are trying to load a pick-up point. In the cool months, when everyone drives into the desert, signal thins out as soon as you leave the main highways, so download offline maps and pin the camp before you leave town. On heavy dust days visibility drops and traffic backs up, which has your map recalculating over and over and using more data than a normal day. During the big event weeks, cells around the exhibition districts slow noticeably in the hours when crowds arrive and leave.