When to ride · March
Mallorca in March
In an average March the daily high at Palma is 17.5 °C, it rains on 4.5 days, and you get 12h 51m of usable riding light a day. The day grows by 1h 18m between the first of the month and the last.
- Mean daily high
- 17.5 °C
- Mean daily low
- 5.2 °C
- Days of rain
- 4.5
- Sunshine
- 202 h
- Light window
- 12h 51m
- Sunrise, mid-month
- 07:00
- Sunset, mid-month
- 18:57
Verdict: is it a good month to ride?
One of the months to book first.
We rate it a peak month for riding conditions. That is our judgement, not a measurement.
Daylight, sunrise and sunset
Three days of March, the first, the middle and the last, calculated for Mallorca. Civil dawn and civil dusk mark the window you can ride in without lights; sunrise and sunset are when the sun crosses a sea horizon.
| Day | Civil dawn | Sunrise | Sunset | Civil dusk | Sun up |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| First of the month | 06:56 | 07:23 | 18:41 | 19:08 | 11h 18m |
| Mid-month | 06:33 | 07:00 | 18:57 | 19:24 | 11h 57m |
| Last of the month | 07:09 | 07:36 | 20:12 | 20:39 | 12h 36m |
How we got this Sun times computed with the NOAA solar-position algorithm for the reference year 2027 and checked against the US Naval Observatory. Sunrise and sunset are the upper limb on a sea horizon; civil dawn and dusk are the sun 6° below it.Computed from civil dawn, sunrise, solar noon, sunset and civil dusk for a sea horizon, computed for Palma and rendered in Balearic local time — including the clock change, which follows the directive rather than a timezone database and is evaluated per event, so the two changeover Sundays are right.Computed 25 September 2026.
Across the month the light window averages 12h 51m against 11h 57m of sun above the horizon, which gives you about 54m of twilight you can use.
The island is wide enough to matter a little: mid-month the sun sets at 18:55 out at Cap de Formentor and 18:58 at Sant Elm. The mountains matter far more. These are sea-horizon times, and a valley under the 1,400 m wall of the Serra loses the sun long before the island does.
The clocks go forward on 28 March 2027. Sunset is 19:08 the evening before and 20:09 that evening. You gain an hour of after-work riding in a single night, which is why the season here feels as though it starts in March rather than April.
Source Directive 2000/84/EC of the European Parliament and of the Council, Art. 2 and 3 · checked 6 August 2026
Wind by time of day
Ask what the wind does in March and you are asking two questions at once. How much of it you ride in depends on the hour you set off, far more than on the month. Whether the month gives you days when the wind stops you riding is the other question, and that one does follow the season. It is the only part of the island’s wind that makes one month better than another.
At 07:00 the wind at Palma de Mallorca averages 2.3 m/s, 8 km/h, which is almost nothing. By 14:00 it averages 5.9 m/s, 21 km/h. That is 3.6 m/s between the two ends of one March day. The largest difference between any two months of the year, compared at the same hour, is 2.6 m/s. So in March, the hour you set off changes the wind 1.4 times as much as the month you booked.
Every hour a rider is plausibly out, through an average March. The last two columns are the two ends of the same distribution: the share of hours with no wind worth the name, and the share at 10.8 m/s or more (39 km/h), strong enough to shape the whole ride.
| Hour | Average | Windier one hour in ten | Dead calm | Force 6 |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 07:00 | 2.3 m/s · 8 km/h | 5.7 m/s | 57.4% | 0.7% |
| 08:00 | 2.3 m/s · 8 km/h | 6.2 m/s | 57.8% | 0.3% |
| 09:00 | 2.7 m/s · 10 km/h | 7.2 m/s | 54.2% | 2.0% |
| 10:00 | 3.7 m/s · 13 km/h | 7.7 m/s | 37.6% | 2.3% |
| 11:00 | 4.6 m/s · 17 km/h | 8.8 m/s | 17.0% | 2.9% |
| 12:00 | 5.1 m/s · 18 km/h | 8.8 m/s | 10.2% | 4.6% |
| 13:00 | 5.7 m/s · 21 km/h | 8.8 m/s | 4.6% | 4.9% |
| 14:00 | 5.9 m/s · 21 km/h | 9.3 m/s | 2.0% | 3.3% |
| 15:00 | 5.8 m/s · 21 km/h | 8.8 m/s | 2.6% | 2.6% |
| 16:00 | 5.7 m/s · 21 km/h | 8.8 m/s | 2.6% | 2.3% |
| 17:00 | 5.2 m/s · 19 km/h | 8.2 m/s | 3.6% | 1.6% |
| 18:00 | 4.6 m/s · 17 km/h | 7.7 m/s | 5.9% | 0.7% |
| 19:00 | 3.6 m/s · 13 km/h | 6.7 m/s | 22.3% | 1.0% |
| 20:00 | 2.8 m/s · 10 km/h | 6.2 m/s | 40.1% | 0.3% |
How we got this 87,017 hourly observations, aggregated by month and by local hour. The quietest and windiest hours are taken across 07:00–20:00 only, so the spread across a day is not won with an hour nobody rides. Force 6 is 10.8 m/s; its share is of those riding hours, weighted by each hour’s own observation count.Computed from NOAA Integrated Surface Database, station 08306099999 at Palma de Mallorca, 2015–2024.Computed 16 August 2026.
The sea breeze arrives at 11:00. In every month of the year it arrives between 11:00 and 13:00, never earlier and never later, in fifty years of records. That is the most useful wind fact for planning a ride here: the wind follows the time of day more than the season, and the hour it starts barely moves from January to December.
March is the month the daily wind shift starts. Morning and afternoon winds are 136° apart at Palma de Mallorca: no longer the settled winter pattern, not yet the clean daily reversal of summer. A tailwind home is a coin toss, so do not plan on one.
Then there are the hard days. Force 6 blows in 2.1% of March’s riding hours at Palma de Mallorca, second of the twelve. Across the year it runs from 0.2% in June to 2.2% in February: about one riding hour in 47 here, against one in 640 at the calm end of the year and one in 46 at the rough end. This part of the wind does follow the season, and no start time avoids it.
The clock here is the island’s and the compass is this station’s. A sea breeze blows onshore, so a wind rose measured on the bay of Palma is not the rose at Port de Pollença, and nothing on this page models a coast it has not measured.
Source NOAA NCEI — Integrated Surface Database, global hourly (NOAA Open Data Dissemination) · checked 16 August 2026A work of the United States Government: public domain, free to use, including commercially.
Fifty years of Mallorca wind, explained for cyclists →
Weather: temperature, rain and sunshine
An average March at Palma airport: 17.5 °C by day, 5.2 °C at the coldest part of the night, 26 mm of rain across 4.5 days and 202 hours of sunshine. These are thirty-year normals, so they say what the month usually does and nothing at all about the week you have booked.
AEMET measures all of that at the airport, five metres above the sea, and you will spend most of the day well above the plain. The highest road summit we cover, Puig Major, stands 868 m above the station, and no sea-level average describes it. A second thermometer, up in the Serra, gives a better idea: compared with the airport hour by hour, it puts the air at that summit at 9.6 °C around midday in March. For conditions in the mountains today rather than on average, AEMET publishes Escorca (Lluc), at 481 m, the one Tramuntana station with fresh readings every day.
Source Agencia Estatal de Meteorología (AEMET) · checked 6 August 2026Temperature, rainfall, rain days and sunshine hours are AEMET’s standard climate values for Palma de Mallorca Airport (station B278), reference period 1981–2010.
Riding after sunset: lights and single file
Two Spanish traffic rules are tied to sunset rather than to the clock, so when they apply changes with the month. Both have applied since 1 October 2026. In March, sunset is at 18:57 mid-month.
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Between sunset and sunrise lights are compulsory. The rule is tied directly to sunset rather than to the general lighting requirement, and a light counts in place of a reflective garment (Art. 118.2). In March that starts at 18:57 mid-month, on essentially every road you will ride here.
“Los conductores de bicicletas que circulen entre el ocaso y la salida del sol, o en condiciones meteorológicas o ambientales que disminuyan sensiblemente la visibilidad, deberán hacer uso al menos de un elemento luminoso o reflectante … visible a una distancia mínima de 150 metros, si circulan en vía interurbana.”
Until 1 October 2026 this sat in Art. 98.1 + 98.3 and was written around the lighting requirement: a reflective garment visible at 150 metres, with no way to satisfy it using a light.
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Two abreast is allowed, keeping as far right as the road permits, but a group riding two abreast goes single file between sunset and sunrise (Art. 36.2). In March that is anything still rolling after 18:57.
“los conductores de bicicletas podrán circular en columna de a dos por el arcén. En el caso de que éste no exista o no fuera transitable y suficiente, podrán circular en columna de a dos por la parte imprescindible de la calzada, si bien deberán colocarse en hilera en los tramos sin visibilidad, cuando afecten a la fluidez de la circulación, o cuando circulen entre el ocaso y la salida del sol”
Until 1 October 2026 the article said nothing about the sun at all, which is why a great deal of cycling advice about Spain still does not mention it.
Source Agencia Estatal Boletín Oficial del Estado · checked 30 September 2026Consolidated text, redaction published 5 June 2026. This is the wording that binds today. The BOE's URL without a date does not serve it.
Every rule that binds a cyclist here, and the six that changed
How it compares with other months
The nearest month to it in the other half of the year is November: 19.0 °C against 17.5 °C, 10h 59m of light against 12h 51m, 6.1 rain days against 4.5. The warmth is the same, but the usable light differs by 1h 52m, and that is the main difference between the two halves of the island’s year.
Either side of it: February at 15.4 °C and April at 19.8 °C.
Booking your trip
Choose the month and the room together, because prices follow the calendar: the weeks we rate highest are the weeks the cycling hotels are full. Price March against the months either side before you confirm anything.
Search places to stay in Mallorca
Compare hire cars at Palma airport
One email when something moves
The 312 on-sale date, a restriction that closes a road to bikes, a rule that changes what you may ride. Sent when it changes — not on a schedule.
How to read the light figures: they are the island’s, not a road’s. Terrain is not modelled, so a valley under the Serra goes dark earlier than the table says and a summit stays light later.
Verified Every figure on this page was re-checked against its source on 6 August 2026. Next review due within 365 days.