"March madness" isn't just a term for college basketball; it can also decribe the weather. Here's a summary of the highs and lows from last month. 

What You Need To Know

  • The warmest temperature was 74 degrees

  • We had nearly a half-inch of snow

  • The coldest day was 21 degrees

March in New York City is a month when we see wild swings in the weather. It seems to go from winter to spring in just hours, which makes sense since part of the month is in winter and part is in spring.

The equinox this year was on March 20. The temperatures last month made us take off and put on layers. The warmest high was 74 degrees on March 7 and 18.

Our coldest reading came just two days after one of these 70-degree days, with a low of 21 degrees happening on the 9th. Also notable was March 28, when afternoon temperatures didn’t make it to the freezing mark. It was the coldest afternoon in New York City on that date since the 1800s.

Overall, though, the month averaged about two-and-a-half degrees warmer than the average. The long-term trend has been for warmer weather in March. Since 1970, March is now 1.4 degrees warmer, on average.

In terms of storms, there weren’t many in March. Total precipitation was 2.39 inches. That’s about half of what an average March would bring. There were 11 days in the month with precipitation. The average snowfall for the month is five inches, but we only had 0.4 inches of snow accumulation.

Overall, March wasn’t too bad of a month for weather in New York City, but certainly the cold outbreaks at the end of the month had us all wondering where spring had gone to. Now it’s on to April with showers, warmer temperatures and longer days.