Weather and the best time to visit, by country

Manama's summer is not really about the daytime 37 C - it is about nights that stay at 30-31 C from June to September. The season worth flying for is November to March.

The Observatory's own description of the pleasant part of the year is November and December. May to September takes about 80% of the rain and carries the typhoon season with it.

Kuwait averages 44 C by day in July and does not drop below 32 C at night. The national met service dates summer from 21 May to 4 November; the season for a visit is what is left.

Macao's dry, mild half is November to March at 18-24 C. The other half is the rain - 226 to 345 mm a month from May to September - and the typhoon signal that suspends every bus in the city.

Temperature never moves - 29-31 °C all year. The monsoon does, and it means opposite things on the two coasts: the east coast's wettest months are the west coast's ordinary ones.

It is 27-29 °C every single month, day and night. The only thing that changes is rain: February and March are the driest months, and the wet half runs from May to December.

Doha's summer is the constraint on everything else: 40-41 °C highs from June to August with nights near 30 °C. November to March is the season the country is built around.

Singapore has no season worth planning around: 28-29 °C every month. What changes is the rain - November to January is the wet end, February the driest month.

The table on this page is Andorra la Vella on the valley floor. The country's own forecast refuses to give one number for the country, and issues three - which is the whole point of Andorra.

Prague has four real seasons: summer highs of 23-25 °C with the heaviest rain of the year, and winters around freezing. May and September are the two months that get everything right.

Liechtenstein's rain peaks in summer, not winter - the opposite of the Mediterranean pattern - and no month is dry. May to September is the comfortable stretch, at 18-24 C.

Luxembourg's rain barely changes across the year - what changes is the light. The national service records under 52 hours of sunshine in each of November, December and January, against 258 in July.

Malta's summer is a genuine drought - July averages nothing at all - and August nights hold at 25 C. April to June is the stretch this page picks, with September the warm-sea alternative.

Chisinau runs a 33 C swing between a January night and an August afternoon, and its rain falls in summer. May, June and September are the mild months; October is the one the country organises itself around.

Monaco's rain arrives in October and November - 106 and 128 mm, more than four times July. May to September is the dry, warm stretch, and the winter never really freezes.

There is no dry season - rain is spread across all twelve months, 53-86 mm each. Summers are mild rather than hot at 19-21 °C, and winters hover a few degrees above freezing.

July and August are Skopje's hottest months and also its driest - 31 C and barely 24 mm between them. The water falls in spring and autumn, and the winter belongs to the basin the city sits in.

San Marino's wet season is autumn, not winter - September, October and November take the most rain of the year. May, June and August to October are the months in the comfortable band.

Belgrade's two shoulders - May to June and September to October - are the months in the 18-27 C band. June is also the wettest month of the Serbian year, and the cold half belongs to the kosava.

Vatican City's weather is Rome's weather over half a square kilometre of open stone. April to May and September to October are the months in the band; the Wednesday audience is the other half of the timing question.

Pristina's comfortable months - May, June and September - are also its wettest. July and August are hot and dry instead, and the winter is the season to think twice about.