Best Time to Visit Nigeria

As on Senegal and Cape Verde, this page carries no table of months, because no climate authority for Nigeria was reachable when it was written and a table assembled from memory is exactly the sort of thing that reads as authoritative and is not.

On Nigeria that omission matters less than usual, because the timing question is genuinely secondary to a different one.

Where comes before when

The UK government advises against all travel to seven Nigerian states and the riverine areas of five more, and against all but essential travel to fourteen further states and parts of the south east. Insecurity is described as increasing across the country, with kidnapping, violent crime and intercommunal violence occurring in all regions.

That reshapes trip planning more than any season does. Of the five heritage sites in this cluster, two are in states with no regional restriction and three are not. Read our safety guide, which names every restricted state, before you decide anything about dates.

What is genuinely seasonal, and sourced

Two things in the sourced material are tied to the calendar.

The Argungu International Fishing and Cultural Festival runs for four days between late February and March, in the north west. UNESCO records the dates that way, as a window rather than a fixed date.

The Sango Festival of Oyo marks the beginning of the Yoruba traditional new year in August and runs for ten days. It is the clearest fixed point in the southern calendar.

Both are described further in our festivals article, including where they sit against the current travel advice.