Wanna know what’s hot right now? The air! Yep, summer is well and truly here, and after one of the warmest winters on record, we’re bracing for a scorcher of a silly season. While we’ve been dreaming of beachside barbecues and boogie boarding, Australia’s climate experts have been busy crunching the numbers to reveal the top ten sweatiest spots to avoid this summer. Warning, Queensland – this news could have you sweating.
To compile the rankings, the crew at Alliance Climate Control analysed Australia’s 80 most populated LGAs (local government areas) across seven factors: population density, average summer temperature, humidity levels, wind speed, amount of shaded tree canopy, cost to run air conditioning and distance to the closest body of water. They then weighted and ranked the scores, with higher totals indicating sweatier spots.
We’ve got full respect for anyone who can survive summer in Darwin, which takes the unfortunate title of Australia's sweatiest city with a scorching total score of 78.15. This Top End toastie recorded the highest average summer dry bulb temperature (removing humidity) at 28.3 degrees Celsius. It also topped the humidity charts and had the second-lowest urban forest cover in Australia.
It’s no surprise that Queensland, the Sunshine State, dominated the rankings, filling positions two to ten. The tropical coastal cities of Mackay and Townsville were the second and third sweatiest cities in Australia with total scores of 77.85 and 77.20. Meanwhile, the Fraser Coast and Brisbane both also scored above 70.
On the flip side, the climate control specialists also looked at the ‘coolest’ (or least sweaty) cities in Australia. As our gateway to Antarctica, it makes sense that Hobart experiences the coolest summers across the nation, with an overall score of 10.65 out of 100. It recorded the lowest average summer dry bulb temperatures of 16.5 degrees Celsius, along with the lowest humidity levels.
Victoria claimed eight of the ten spots for the coolest cities in Australia, with Greater Bendigo in second and Ballarat in fourth – both averaging summer temperatures of 17.8 degrees Celsius. You can check out the full breakdown of data here or see our summary of the sweatiest and coolest cities below.
These are the 10 sweatiest cities in Australia:
- Darwin, NT
- Mackay, QLD
- Townsville, QLD
- Fraser Coast, QLD
- Brisbane, QLD
- Cairns, QLD
- Moreton Bay, QLD
- Gold Coast, QLD
- Redland, QLD
- Ipswich, QLD
These are the 10 coolest cities in Australia:
- Hobart, TAS
- Greater Bendigo, VIC
- Launceston, TAS
- Ballarat, VIC
- Whittlesea, VIC
- Yarra Ranges, VIC
- Greater Geelong, VIC
- Moonee Valley, VIC
- Wyndham, VIC
- Brimbank, VIC