Texas · 14 m elevation

Barometric Pressure in Houston, TX

• 30.02Average pressure (inHg, sea level)
• 107.3Swing days a year · 38th of 50
• 38.6Big-swing days a year (≥10 hPa)
• 52.5Significant 24h drop days a year

Overview

Houston averages 30.02 inHg (1016.6 hPa) and 107.3 significant pressure swing days a year — 20.4 in January, 0.2 in July. Full seasonal detail.

Houston's barometer sits close to 30.02 inHg (1016.6 hPa) on average, with a median of 30.00 inHg (1015.8 hPa). Ninety percent of hours fall between 29.78 inHg (1008.5 hPa) and 30.33 inHg (1027 hPa), and the standard deviation is just 0.16 inHg (5.56 hPa) — below the national median of 6.87 hPa across the 50 cities tracked here.

At 14 meters elevation, the correction between station pressure and sea-level pressure is trivial: the surface mean is 29.97 inHg (1014.9 hPa) against a sea-level mean of 30.02 inHg (1016.6 hPa), a gap of about 0.05 inHg (1.7 hPa). A home barometer set to raw station pressure will read almost exactly what forecasters report, which is not the case in Denver or Albuquerque.

Nationally, Houston is quiet. It logs 107.3 significant swing days per year (24-hour change of 6 hPa or more), ranking #38 of 50, and 38.6 big-swing days (10 hPa or more), also #38. The national medians are 180.7 and 86.1, so the typical city in this set sees roughly 1.7 times Houston's swing days and 2.2 times its big-swing days. Denver, ranked #1, runs 2.6 times Houston's swing days and 4.4 times its big-swing days. That annual average hides the real structure: Houston effectively has two pressure climates, and the yearly figure is a blend of a busy winter and an almost motionless summer.

Migraine & pressure-sensitivity outlook

• Low — under 6 hPa (0.18 inHg)
• Elevated — 6 to 10 hPa
• High — 10 hPa (0.30 inHg) or more
• Dashed outline = forecast (after today)

Association only. This calendar shows days when pressure changed — or is forecast to change — sharply over 24 hours, conditions associated with pressure sensitivity in some people. It is not a prediction of symptoms, not a diagnosis, and not medical advice. The 30 days of history are there so you can compare the days you actually felt something against what the barometer did. Talk to a clinician about headache or migraine management.

For people who track barometric pressure, Houston is a comparatively steady place with a concentrated cool-season window. A typical 24-hour change is only 0.06 inHg (2 hPa), and the 95th percentile change is 0.28 inHg (9.4 hPa). Significant drops — falls of 6 hPa or more over 24 hours, conditions many pressure-sensitive people report as triggers — occur 52.5 times a year, against 107.3 total swing days.

Those drops are not spread evenly. January alone accounts for 10.5 drop days, with February at 8.9, December at 8.4 and March at 7.6; those four months hold about two-thirds of the annual total. July and August average 0.1 drop days each, and June 0.4. The practical read: late fall through early spring is when frontal passages stack up, and mid-June through September is among the calmest stretches any large US city offers — with the caveat that the third-deepest fall in the record, 0.61 inHg (20.7 hPa), landed on July 8, 2024.

Against peers, Houston is the calmest of the large Texas cities in this dataset: Fort Worth sees about 1.5 times its swing days and Dallas about 1.45 times. Along the Gulf it runs slightly busier than New Orleans, at 1.33 times that city's swing days, and about 5.4 times Miami, the calmest city on the list. Anyone arriving from Denver, Boston or Minneapolis will find far fewer pressure events here; anyone coming from Miami or Tampa will notice a cool-season cadence that did not exist before.

Seasonal patterns

The cool season carries nearly all the movement. January averages 20.4 swing days, February 17.1, December 16.5 and March 15.2 — January by itself produces more significant swings than Miami records in a full year (19.8). Monthly variability peaks at 0.21 inHg (7.04 hPa) in January. Cold fronts crossing the upper Texas coast from November through March are the mechanism: each passage drives a fall and then a sharp rebound behind it, and Houston's largest 24-hour rise on record is 0.72 inHg (24.4 hPa).

Summer is the opposite. July averages 0.2 swing days and August 0.3, with monthly variability collapsing to 0.07 inHg (2.47 hPa) in July. Under a persistent maritime tropical airmass there are no fronts to move the barometer, and readings can drift within a few hundredths of an inch for weeks. Mean pressure follows the same cycle, from 30.15 inHg (1021 hPa) in January down to 29.93 inHg (1013.5 hPa) in June.

The extremes cut both ways. The record high, 30.76 inHg (1041.8 hPa), came on January 8, 2017, in the strong-high season. The record low, 29.27 inHg (991.1 hPa), was set at 9 a.m. on July 8, 2024 — and that same timestamp closes a 0.61 inHg (20.7 hPa) 24-hour fall, the third-deepest in the record. The two largest drops are cool-season: 0.63 inHg (21.4 hPa) ending January 8, 2024, and 0.62 inHg (21.1 hPa) ending January 24, 2023. Rounding out the top five are 0.55 inHg (18.6 hPa) on November 28, 2016, and 0.51 inHg (17.3 hPa) on December 31, 2016. The fastest six-hour fall on record is 0.45 inHg (15.2 hPa). Low average variance does not mean small events — it means rare ones.

Month by month

Swing days: 24-hour change of at least 6 hPa (0.18 inHg). Drop days: 24-hour fall of at least 6 hPa. Averages per year, 2015–2024.

Records and extremes

Sharpest 24-hour drops, 2015–2024

Nearby cities

• Austin, TX
• San Antonio, TX
• Dallas, TX
• Fort Worth, TX
• New Orleans, LA
• Oklahoma City, OK

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