Greenland has a polar climate that ranges from tundra along the coasts to a permanent ice cap covering roughly 80% of the island’s interior. Temperatures swing from summer highs around 50°F on the southwest coast to winter lows that plunge far below zero inland. The difference between standing on a coastal fjord in July and standing atop the ice sheet in December is staggering, making Greenland one of the most climatically extreme places on Earth.
Two Climate Zones, One Island
Greenland fits into two polar climate classifications. The coasts fall under tundra climate, where the warmest month averages above freezing but stays below 50°F. The vast interior, buried under ice up to two miles thick, qualifies as ice cap climate, where no month averages above freezing at all. These two zones create drastically different living conditions just a few hundred miles apart.
The southwest coast, where most of Greenland’s population lives, is the mildest region. Ocean currents moderate temperatures, fog rolls in during summer, and precipitation is relatively generous. The far north and the high interior are among the coldest, driest places in the Northern Hemisphere, more comparable to Antarctica than to coastal Scandinavia.
Seasonal Temperatures on the Coast
Nuuk, the capital on the southwest coast, gives the best snapshot of what “mild” means in Greenland terms. July is the warmest month, with average highs near 49°F and lows around 42°F. February is the coldest, with highs around 19°F and lows near 12°F. Over the full year, temperatures typically range between 11°F and 50°F, and readings above 55°F or below -1°F are uncommon.
Spring arrives slowly. March highs hover around 22°F, and temperatures don’t consistently climb above freezing until May. By June, highs reach the mid-40s, and the long Arctic daylight keeps things relatively warm around the clock. Autumn reverses the process quickly: September highs of 42°F drop to 27°F by November, and winter settles in by early December.
Extremes on the Ice Sheet
The interior ice sheet operates on a completely different scale. The lowest temperature ever recorded in the Northern Hemisphere was measured in Greenland: -69.6°C (-93.3°F), logged on December 22, 1991, at a remote automatic weather station called Klinck. That station sits at an elevation of about 10,200 feet near the topographic summit of the ice sheet, where thin air, high altitude, and perpetual winter darkness combine to produce extraordinary cold.
Even in summer, temperatures at the summit rarely climb above -10°F. The ice sheet reflects most incoming sunlight back into space, which keeps the surface locked in deep cold year-round. This reflective effect is one reason the interior stays so much colder than coastal areas at the same latitude.
Piteraq Winds
Greenland produces one of the world’s most dramatic wind phenomena: the piteraq, a type of gravity-driven wind that races down the steep eastern slopes of the ice sheet and slams into coastal towns. The mechanism works like a breaking ocean wave, but made of air. Cold, dense air pools over the ice sheet’s surface. When a low-pressure system passes to the east or southeast, it shoves that reservoir of cold air downhill. As the heavy air accelerates under gravity and gets funneled through narrow valleys, it compresses and picks up tremendous speed.
The town of Tasiilaq on the east coast is particularly vulnerable. It sits inside a valley that acts like a nozzle, squeezing the descending air into a tighter space and increasing its velocity. By the time the wind reaches the fjord, it can arrive with little warning and extraordinary force. Piteraqs have historically produced hurricane-strength gusts and can make outdoor activity impossible for hours or even days.
How Fast Greenland Is Warming
Greenland is warming roughly twice as fast as the global average. Climate models predicted that the island’s temperature increases would outpace the global mean by a factor of 1.2 to 3, and observational analysis has confirmed a ratio of about 2.2 when the effects of natural climate cycles like the North Atlantic Oscillation are filtered out. This amplified warming is driven by feedback loops: as ice melts, darker land and ocean surfaces absorb more heat, which melts more ice.
Some coastal tundra regions are already seeing warming trends that could eventually push them out of the polar climate category entirely, into subarctic classification. That would mean longer growing seasons, changes in vegetation, and shifts in wildlife habitat along the coasts. Sea surface temperatures in the waters east of Greenland have been running 1° to 3°C above the long-term average in recent years, further accelerating ice loss from glaciers that terminate in the ocean.
The Ice Sheet’s Shrinking Mass
Greenland’s ice sheet has been losing mass every year for over two decades. The long-term average from 2003 to 2024 was a net loss of about 219 billion metric tons per year. The 2025 measurement (covering September 2024 through August 2025) came in at a loss of 129 billion metric tons, a lighter loss than usual thanks to above-average snowfall and below-average surface melt. But ice discharge, the rate at which glaciers calve icebergs into the sea, was above the 1991 to 2020 average at 491 billion metric tons per year.
The ice sheet’s mass balance is a tug-of-war between inputs (snowfall, refrozen rain) and outputs (meltwater runoff, evaporation, iceberg calving). Even in a “good” year like 2025, the outputs still won. The long-term trajectory remains one of net loss, and the ice sheet holds enough frozen water to raise global sea levels by about 24 feet if it were to melt entirely.
What Coastal Life Actually Feels Like
If you visit Greenland’s southwest coast in summer, expect cool, overcast days with temperatures in the 40s, occasional rain, and long hours of daylight that never fully fade in June and July. Humidity is moderate near the coast, and fog is common where cold ocean currents meet warmer air. Winter brings extreme darkness, with Nuuk receiving only a few hours of low-angle sunlight in December, and temperatures that hover between the low teens and low 20s for months.
North Greenland is far harsher. Towns above the Arctic Circle experience complete polar night in winter and 24-hour sunlight in summer, but even peak summer temperatures stay well below what the southwest enjoys. Precipitation drops off sharply in the north, making it a polar desert in some areas, with annual moisture levels comparable to the Sahara despite being surrounded by ocean and ice.