Will it snow in Miami this weekend? What the cold will bring to Florida
With temperatures set to plunge into the 30s in Miami by Sunday and with wind chills below freezing in the 20s, some people are flashing back to Jan. 19, 1977 — the day it snowed in Miami.
And as any grade school student knows, 32 degrees and under is freezing, and freezing can mean snow.
“Just wait, it’s going to be shockingly cold,” CBS News Miami meteorologist Lissette Gonzalez said in her Wednesday morning broadcast.
Cold enough to snow in Miami on Sunday and overnight into Monday? Temperatures in South Florida are forecast to drop to 37, and feel like 27.
The answer: Not likely, said Will Redman, a meteorologist with the National Weather Service in Miami.
For it to snow, “the main thing ... we’re going need is moisture, and there’s a pretty good chance that’s not going to be there,” Redman said. “One of the things you look at is ... a measure of the amount of moisture in the atmosphere.”
So, given the dry forecast, no snow even though it will be cold.
The rain predicted for South Florida during this week’s hardy cold snap, which will keep temperatures in the 40s and 50s through at least the middle of next week, could fall Friday and Saturday, when chances are 30% in the Miami and Fort Lauderdale areas.
But it won’t be cold enough to snow those days, Redman said.
“We’re looking at temps, basically, in the 50s and upper 40s for lows on Saturday morning,” he said. “So even if there was to be a chance for rain on Friday and into Saturday there’s really no chance for [snow] to happen.”
MORE: How cold will it get in South Florida this weekend? See the coldest points
So, break out the parkas. But shovels and scrapers aren’t necessary — not that they were on Jan. 19, 1977, when snowflakes fell in Homestead, tickling the faces of early morning risers. “By 9:30 a.m., South Florida’s big snow show was over, melted by the sun’s rays,” the Miami Herald reported at the time.
President Gerald Ford was in his last day of office on that Jan. 19. We watched “Happy Days” on television that night on WPLG-Channel 10. And we checked in to the Eagles’ “Hotel California” album that was all over South Florida radio stations Y-100 and WQAM. Life in the cold lane carried on under our scarves and jackets.
Will snow fall elsewhere in Florida?
If you are dead set on seeing snow in Florida and want to share with your children and grandkids, can you hustle over to another part of the state?
The National Weather Service is predicting a “slight chance of light snow” between 11 p.m. Saturday and 1 a.m. Sunday in the Tampa region, with air temperatures in the low 30s. It’s the same for Cedar Key in the same late Saturday hours when temperatures are forecast at 29 following a 60% rain chance Friday and 20% Saturday in the north-central region of Florida.
Tampa’s WFLA climate specialist Jeff Berardelli excited his Facebook followers Thursday with a video explaining that snow could happen in Tampa. But several factors have to fall in line.
“It’s a small chance, not a great chance, but any chance is notable, and it’s probably one of the best setups that we could have around here,” Berardelli said in his broadcast. “Surface temperatures will be cold enough for snowflakes, not for sticking, but for snowflakes.”
Single digits in North Florida. Teens in Central Florida. The 20s all way down into South Florida. Peak wind chills below 10 degrees in places like Tallahassee, Jacksonville, Ocala and farther south.
“We’re talking 15 for a ‘feels-like’ temperature in Lakeland. Jupiter, 18. A wind chill of 23 in Miami,” he said. “That is a very rare sight here in the state of Florida.”
Frost and freeze warnings cover almost all of those regions of the state.
But enough moisture is going to need to be in the air to make any measure of snow appear. Aside from Tampa and Cedar Key, the National Weather Service isn’t calling for snow in most cities, including the Orlando area, home of Disney and Universal.
Those parks — Walt Disney World, Epcot, Universal Studios — will remain open during the weekend arctic blast. But the water theme park portions, including Universal’s Volcano Bay and Disney’s Typhoon Lagoon, will be closed Saturday through Monday. Some rides and attractions and character meet-and-greets could be modified or temporarily halted, according to reports.
South Florida and Keys temperatures
Here are some forecast low temperatures Sunday morning around South Florida, according to the weather service.
- Miami and Fort Lauderdale, around 36.
- Palm Beach, 33 or 34.
- The Florida Keys, in the mid-40s. Key West, closer to 50. Maybe bustling Duval Street is your retreat destination for shared bodily warmth this weekend.
Previous super chills
The last time Miami saw the kind of temperatures that are forecast for Sunday and Monday was Dec. 28, 2010, according to the weather center. On that date Miami International Airport dropped to 39 degrees.
A December 1989 cold front was so severe in South Florida it devastated swaths of Florida’s agriculture industry that grows vegetables, strawberries, plants and sugarcane. The citrus industry was particularly damaged in South and Central Florida, seeing about 30% of its $1.4 billion citrus crop at the time wiped out.
Snow flurries were reported in Tampa and Sarasota, and the thermometer dropped to 30 degrees at Miami International Airport on Christmas Day 1989.
A similar 30-something plunge in February 1991 had citrus farmers bracing to protect their crops. Citrus can be damaged when the temperature drops below 27 degrees for more than four hours.
This story was originally published January 28, 2026 at 3:32 PM.
