The season
The best time to visit Montenegro
June and September. If you want one answer, that is it — the water is warm, the bay is not full, and the light in September sits lower and turns gold earlier in the afternoon. July and August are hotter and busier and cost more everywhere on the coast. May and October are quieter and cheaper, and the sea is cold. What follows is the same question answered month by month, from seven seasons of running one boat out of Tivat.
The season month by month
Written from the water rather than from a weather table. What changes most across the season is not temperature — it is how many other boats are in the anchorage.
| Month | The sea | How busy | What it is good for |
|---|---|---|---|
| May | Cold. Swimming is short and brave | Empty | Walking the towns, and the coast to yourself |
| June | Warm by the middle of the month | Filling but not full | The month we would pick. Long days, wildflowers still on the mountain |
| July | Warm everywhere | Busy. Kotor fills by nine | Heat and long evenings, if you start early |
| August | Warmest of the year | Fullest. Book months ahead | Guaranteed swimming, at the price of company |
| September | Still warm, into October | Emptying week by week | The other month we would pick. The light is the best of the year |
| October | Cooling fast | Empty | The bay without anyone in it, if you do not mind a jumper |
The season runs May to October. Outside it the boat is out of the water.
Why June and September
Two different summers, not a better and a worse one.
In June the mountain still smells of wildflowers and the days are at their longest, so an eight-hour charter finishes with two hours of light to spare. The water has warmed but the crowds have not fully arrived — the Blue Cave in mid-June at eleven is a different place from the same cave in mid-August.
September trades the flowers for the light. The sun sits lower, so the golden hour starts earlier and lasts longer, and the bay turns colour around six rather than eight. The sea is still holding August's heat well into the month, which is the part people do not expect: September swimming is often better than June swimming.
The practical difference is availability. July and August are usually gone by March. June and September can still be had in spring, and the same yacht costs the same money in a bay with a third of the boats in it.
What actually changes across the season
Not the temperature so much as the traffic. Cruise ships tie up in Kotor from about nine in the morning through the summer, and the old town changes character completely for the next six hours. Coaches reach Perast from Kotor around eleven, and Perast is one street 300 metres long — the difference between arriving at ten and arriving at noon is the difference between an empty street and a queue.
The Blue Cave is the same story with a harder edge. It only lights up between roughly 11:00 and 12:00, when the sun reaches the angle where its light passes under the water at the entrance. That window does not move with the season, but the number of boats waiting outside it does.
Wind is the one thing that ignores the calendar. A hard south-easterly closes the open coast for a day or two several times a season, in any month. On a day charter that day is simply lost; on a week aboard the captain reshuffles it and takes the sheltered inner bay instead.
One local oddity worth knowing whatever month you come: the water along Dobrota and Prčanj stays cold all summer, because freshwater springs come straight out of the rock underneath. In August it is a genuine shock after the open bay. The warm swimming is nearer the mouth — Stradioti, Žanjic and further west.
If you are coming in a particular month
May and October
Bring a layer
The middle of the day is warm and the return leg at six is not. The bay cools quickly once the sun is behind the mountain.
June and September
Book in spring
These two go later than July and August but not by much, and they are the weeks people rebook the following year.
July and August
Start early
Leaving at nine puts you at Perast and the islands before the coaches, and at the Blue Cave inside its light window.
Any month
Keep a spare day
A south-easterly can take a day out of any week. If your dates have no slack, the inner bay is the plan that always works.
Tell us which month you are thinking of
Send the dates and we will say honestly what the water and the traffic are doing then — and what is still free.
What people usually ask
What is the best month to visit Montenegro?
June or September. June has the longest days and the flowers still on the mountain; September has the better light and a sea still holding August's warmth. Both are quieter than July and August and cost the same to charter.
When is the sea warmest in Montenegro?
Late July and August. September stays warm well into the month, which surprises people — September swimming is often better than June swimming, because the sea takes the whole summer to heat up and is slow to let go.
Is May too early?
For swimming, mostly yes. For everything else it is the quietest month of the season: the towns are empty, the light is clean, and the anchorages have nobody in them. Bring a layer for the way home.
How far ahead should we book?
July and August generally go by March. June and September can still be found in spring. If your dates are fixed, ask as early as you can — there is one boat, and when it is out it is out.
Does the season affect the Blue Cave?
Not the light — the cave lights up between about 11:00 and 12:00 in any month, because that is when the sun passes under the water at the entrance. What changes is how many boats are queueing for it, and in August that matters more than the light does.