Best Time to Visit Siem Reap: Month by Month, Including What the Lake Is Doing

November to February is the answer for most people: dry, clear skies for sunrise, mornings comfortable enough to spend four hours on sandstone, and every road and boat running. It is also the busiest and most expensive stretch of the year.

The caveat is the lake. The Tonle Sap reverses direction twice a year — during the monsoon the Mekong pushes water back up the Tonle Sap river and the lake swells to several times its dry-season size, then drains again from about November. That single fact decides whether the floating villages are worth a day of your trip.

So the honest version is this: November to February is best for the temples, and September to November is best for the lake, and the overlap in November is why that month quietly beats December for a lot of travellers. Detail on which village works in which month is in our Tonle Sap guide.

The other thing worth saying out loud: the rains are underrated. June to October usually means one heavy hour in the afternoon rather than all-day drizzle, the temples are green and comparatively empty, the moats and reflecting pools are full, and prices are a third lower. Photographers who know Angkor tend to come then.

November — Arguably the best month of the year. The rains have stopped, the light is clean, the landscape is still green rather than dust-brown, the lake is near its fullest, and peak pricing has not fully arrived. Bon Om Touk, the water festival marking the river's reversal, falls in November and is the biggest holiday in the Cambodian calendar.

December — Perfect conditions and the year's heaviest crowds. Christmas and New Year see room rates double and the sunrise pool three deep. Book weeks out.

January — Dry, the coolest mornings of the year, and crowds easing after the first week. Excellent.

February — Reliable and dry, still comfortable, the lake dropping. A good month with no real flaw beyond price.

March — Heat arriving. Mornings still fine, afternoons hard work. The lake is low and the floating villages are at their least interesting.

April — The hottest month, mid-thirties by late morning with no shade in the courtyards. Khmer New Year, around 13–16 April, is a genuine national shutdown and a water fight; Siem Reap is busy with domestic travellers and a lot of small businesses close for it.

May–June — The rains establish. Hot and humid, with afternoon storms. Prices fall noticeably. The landscape starts turning.

July–August — Proper wet season, usually a heavy afternoon hour rather than a washout. Green temples, thin crowds, European summer keeps hotels moderately busy anyway.

September–October — The wettest weeks, and the best ones for the lake: the Tonle Sap is at maximum, the flooded forest is reachable, and Kampong Phluk's stilt houses stand in water. Cheapest rates of the year. Some unsealed roads to outlying temples get difficult.

Whatever month you pick, the shape of a Siem Reap day does not change: the temples reward early mornings and punish the middle of the day.

From March to May the heat sits in the mid-thirties by late morning and there is no shade in the Angkor Wat courtyards or on the Bayon's upper terrace. The move is a 05:00 or 08:00 start, off the stone by noon, and back out at 15:30 for the last three hours. Push through 13:00 in April and you will spend day two in the hotel.

Even in January the same logic holds for crowds rather than heat. Sunrise draws several hundred people to the northern reflecting pool; that crowd leaves en masse for breakfast around 06:30, and the twenty minutes after is the emptiest Angkor Wat gets all day. The tour buses arrive from about 09:00.

Rain season tactics: carry a light poncho rather than an umbrella, because the wind comes with it; the sandstone gets genuinely slippery, especially the upper-level stairs at Angkor Wat and the rubble at Beng Mealea; and keep one indoor or short-radius option in reserve — a cooking class or food walk is the standard rainy-afternoon insurance here.

Mosquitoes are worth taking seriously in the wet months, particularly around the lake and at dusk in the countryside. Dengue is present in Cambodia; repellent and covered ankles in the evening are the sensible minimum.

Peak (20 December – 5 January): rates two to three times the annual average, minimum stays at the better hotels, and the sunrise pool at its worst. Book two months out.

High (November, mid-January – February): perhaps 30–50% above low season with good availability. Where most travellers should aim.

Shoulder (March, October): softening prices, workable conditions, noticeably fewer people.

Low (May – September): 30–50% below peak. Very good hotels at ordinary prices, and booking a few days ahead is fine.

What things cost: guesthouse double USD 15–30; a good pool hotel USD 40–80; the well-known boutiques USD 120 and up. A tuk-tuk temple day USD 18–25, a private car USD 35–55, a licensed guide USD 35–45. The Angkor pass is USD 62 for three days on top of all of it.

Festivals to plan around rather than into: Khmer New Year in mid-April shuts much of the country and floods Siem Reap with domestic visitors; Bon Om Touk, the water festival, falls in November and is genuinely worth seeing, especially in Phnom Penh where the boat races run on the river; Pchum Ben in September or October is a solemn ancestor festival and a public holiday, when pagodas are busy and some businesses close.

If you are still choosing dates around a whole trip rather than one city, our Cambodia itineraries set out what each trip length can actually reach.