Paris in March: Weather, Events and the Best Tours

Is March a good time to visit Paris?

March is the awkward month, and also the one with the most going on. Fourteen wet days is the highest count of the ten, but 12.3C highs and 11 hours 54 minutes of daylight make it usable, and Easter falling on 28 March puts the whole of Holy Week inside it.

Get the Easter date right and everything else about March follows. Easter Sunday 2027 is 28 March, which means Palm Sunday is 21 March and the whole of Holy Week sits in the last full week of the month. An April 2027 trip misses Easter entirely. That is the opposite of most years and it is the single most common planning error we would expect people to make about this particular spring.

The weather is genuinely the worst of the spring. Fourteen wet days is more than any other month covered here, more than November, more than December, and the 72mm arrives as the sort of blustery Atlantic weather that makes a walking day unpleasant without being dramatic enough to force you indoors. March in Paris is the month of the ruined afternoon rather than the ruined day.

Against that, the light comes back fast. Daylight goes from about 11 hours 15 minutes at the start of the month to 12 hours 45 minutes at the end, and the clocks going forward on 28 March jumps sunset from around 19:15 on the Saturday to about 20:15 on the Monday. The last four days of March feel like a completely different season from the first four, and they are the best value in the month.

Paris weather in March

March averages 12.3C highs and 3.9C lows, with 72mm of rain falling across fourteen wet days, the highest wet-day count of the ten months covered here. Mid-month daylight is 11 hours 54 minutes, and the clocks go forward on Sunday 28 March, pushing sunset past 20:00.

Temperature, rainfall and wet days: Open-Meteo ERA5 reanalysis for Paris, ten-year observed means. Daylight and sunset: day length computed for Paris (48.86N, 2.35E) on the 15th of each month.

Fourteen wet days out of thirty-one means roughly nine days in twenty have rain on them, which is the poorest ratio in the guide. What saves March is that the rain is showery and wind-driven rather than the settled all-day cloud of November: it will interrupt an afternoon rather than write off a day, and the gaps between showers in March are brighter than anything the winter offered.

The temperature is transitional in an unhelpful way. Average highs of 12.3C with lows of 3.9C is a nearly nine-degree daily swing, so a March day can start at frost and reach shirt-sleeves by three, then drop away again. Layering matters more in March than in any other month here, and a single heavy coat is the wrong answer.

The clock change on Sunday 28 March is the biggest single daylight event of the year, and in 2027 it lands on Easter Sunday. Sunset moves from around 19:15 on Saturday 27 March to about 20:15 on Monday 29 March. From that morning onwards, evening plans are possible again for the first time since October, and the entire shape of what is worth booking changes.

Crowds, prices and what to book ahead

The first three weeks are quiet and cheap. Holy Week from 21 March and the Easter weekend of 28 and 29 March bring the first real crowds of the year. Paris Fashion Week from 1 to 9 March affects hotel supply but not the monuments.

Paris Fashion Week runs from 1 to 9 March, and its effect is the same as it was in September and October: rooms in the central arrondissements get scarcer and pricier for the duration, while the museums and monuments carry on exactly as before. It is a trade event, not something to attend, and outside of the hotel market you will not notice it.

The Easter weekend is a different matter. Easter Sunday on 28 March and Easter Monday on 29 March form a long weekend that is a public holiday in France, and it brings European short-break traffic to Paris for the first time since New Year. Book that weekend properly ahead. Note also that Easter Monday is a Monday, which means the Chateau de Versailles is closed, as it is on every Monday of the year.

March 2027 begins on a Monday and contains five Mondays and five Tuesdays. That is the worst weekly-closure ratio of the ten months: ten of the thirty-one days are affected, five with no Versailles or Orsay and five with no Louvre. On a short March trip it is genuinely worth mapping your dates against those days before you book anything.

The best tours in Paris in March

Ranked for March: covered experiences lead on fourteen wet days, and the cathedral rises for Holy Week. From the 28th, when the clocks go forward, the evening options become viable again. Prices, ratings and review counts were checked against live GetYourGuide listings on 28 July 2026.

1. Musée d’Orsay Skip-the-Line Tour with Guide

4.8 out of 5 from 1,177 verified GetYourGuide reviews • from £60 • 1.5 - 2.5 hours

Ranked first on the numbers: fourteen wet days is the worst of the ten months, and this is the best-rated thing on the site at 4.8. The Orsay is closed on Mondays, and March 2027 has five of them, so check your dates carefully before assuming it is available.

Best for in March: Fourteen wet days and the highest rating we sell

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2. Notre-Dame Cathedral Guided Tour, Inside and Out

4.7 out of 5 from 1,676 verified GetYourGuide reviews • from £18 • 1 hour

Ranked up for a dated reason rather than a weather one. Holy Week runs from Palm Sunday on 21 March to Easter Sunday on 28 March, and it is the peak of the cathedral year. Be clear what £18 buys: general entry to Notre-Dame is free, this tour queues in the ordinary line with you and is not a skip-the-line ticket.

Best for in March: Holy Week, 21 to 28 March

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3. Mona Lisa & Louvre Masterpieces Tour

4.7 out of 5 from 7,461 verified GetYourGuide reviews • from £50 • 1 - 3.5 hours

March showers ruin afternoons rather than whole days, which makes a fixed three-hour guided route the right kind of booking. The Louvre is closed on Tuesdays and March 2027 contains five of them, on the 2nd, 9th, 16th, 23rd and 30th.

Best for in March: A defined plan for a showery afternoon

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4. Louvre Priority Access: Mona Lisa & Museum Icons

4.5 out of 5 from 1,115 verified GetYourGuide reviews • from £60 • 2 - 3 hours

The priority-access two to three hour version, and a sensible March choice because it leaves half a day free for whichever half the weather cooperates with. Same closing days apply: five Tuesdays with no Louvre this month.

Best for in March: A shorter, cheaper Louvre option

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5. Versailles Skip-the-Line Palace and Gardens Tour

4.7 out of 5 from 11,551 verified GetYourGuide reviews • from £49 • 2 hours

The fountains do not run until April, so March remains a state-rooms trip and this guided tour is the right ticket rather than the Full Access passport. The critical detail: Versailles is closed on every Monday including Easter Monday on 29 March, and March 2027 has five Mondays in total.

Best for in March: Versailles before the fountains return

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6. Catacombs Entry & Seine Cruise with Audio Guide

4.5 out of 5 from 1,483 verified GetYourGuide reviews • from £98 • 3 hours

Twenty metres underground at a constant 14C, which in the wettest month of the guide is a genuine advantage. The paired Seine cruise gives you the flexibility to take the river half on whichever part of the day is not raining.

Best for in March: The one thing March weather cannot touch

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7. 1-Hour Seine Cruise from the Eiffel Tower

4.4 out of 5 from 88,160 verified GetYourGuide reviews • from £15 • 1 hour

At 11 hours 54 minutes of daylight mid-month, and more than twelve and a half hours by the end, a Seine cruise works as a daytime experience again for the first time since October. Covered seating means one of March's fourteen wet days does not spoil it.

Best for in March: The month the river becomes a daylight trip again

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8. Macaron Class at Galeries Lafayette

4.3 out of 5 from 1,352 verified GetYourGuide reviews • from £50 • 1.5 hours

In a month where the odds of an interrupted afternoon are the highest of the ten, a fixed indoor ninety minutes under the Galeries Lafayette dome is worth more than usual. You leave with four macarons you made and two recipes to take home.

Best for in March: A guaranteed dry ninety minutes

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9. Moulin Rouge Cabaret Show Ticket with Champagne

4.7 out of 5 from 17,909 verified GetYourGuide reviews • from £100 • 2 hours

For the first three weeks of March, sunset is still before 19:30 and an indoor evening remains the obvious plan. From the 28th, when the clocks go forward and sunset passes 20:00, the calculation shifts and outdoor evenings return, so this is more valuable early in the month than late.

Best for in March: Evenings before the clocks change

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10. Evening Lights Cruise with Bateaux-Mouches

4.3 out of 5 from 2,199 verified GetYourGuide reviews • from £15 • 70 minutes - 1.5 hours

Before the clock change, a 19:30 departure puts you on a lit river for £15. After 28 March you need to sail closer to 21:00 for the same effect, and by May you need 22:00. March is the last comfortable month of the ten for an illuminated cruise at an ordinary hour. Board at Pont de l'Alma, Port de la Conference in the 8th.

Best for in March: The last month a lit cruise is easy

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Still absent in March: the Giverny day trip, which is in the last of its five closed months, and the Versailles Full Access passport, whose fountain upgrade does not start again until April. Also off the list, the open-top sightseeing bus and the fourteen-hour Mont-Saint-Michel coach day; both come back in April when the rain drops to 51mm and the daylight passes thirteen hours. Gap we cannot fill and would like to: nothing we sell is tied to Holy Week or Easter, which is the biggest thing happening in Paris in March 2027. Notre-Dame is free to enter and its liturgical calendar is published by the cathedral itself.

Events and festivals in March 2027

March 2027 carries the whole of Holy Week. Easter Sunday is 28 March, which is also the day the clocks go forward, and Easter Monday on 29 March is a French public holiday. Paris Fashion Week runs from 1 to 9 March.

The Easter date is the fact to take away from this page. Easter Sunday 2027 falls on 28 March, so Holy Week runs from Palm Sunday on 21 March through to the 28th and sits entirely within March. Anyone booking an Easter break to Paris for April 2027 will arrive after the whole thing is over. Notre-Dame is free to enter and holds the fullest liturgical programme of its year in that week; the cathedral publishes its own schedule.

The clocks going forward on the same Sunday is a coincidence of the calendar and a useful one. The change happens overnight on 27 to 28 March, so Easter Sunday itself already has the longer evening, and sunset moves from about 19:15 on the Saturday to roughly 20:15 by the Monday. The Easter long weekend is therefore the first weekend of the year with a proper evening in it.

Easter Monday on 29 March is a French public holiday, and it is worth pairing that with the weekly closure information: the Chateau de Versailles closes every Monday of the year, and Easter Monday is no exception. A long-weekend visitor planning Versailles for the bank holiday Monday will find it shut. The gardens and the park are open, as they are every day.

What is closed in March

March 2027 has the worst weekly-closure ratio of the ten months: five Mondays with no Musee d'Orsay and no Chateau de Versailles, including Easter Monday on 29 March, and five Tuesdays with no Louvre. Giverny stays shut for its final winter month.

Weekly closing days and fixed holiday closures read directly from the Louvre, Musee d'Orsay and Chateau de Versailles official sites on 29 July 2026. Seasonal opening dates for 2027 are set by each site and can move, so confirm before you book a non-refundable trip around one.

March 2027 is the month to check a calendar before booking. It opens on a Monday and runs thirty-one days, so it contains five Mondays and five Tuesdays. That means ten of the thirty-one days have one of the three biggest venues shut, five with no Musee d'Orsay and no Versailles, five with no Louvre. On a three-night trip it is entirely possible to lose two of your three days to closing days without realising.

The Easter Monday case is the one that catches people. Versailles closes every Monday of the year, and a public holiday does not change that, so Monday 29 March 2027 is not a Versailles day. It is a common assumption that a bank holiday means everything opens; at Versailles the reverse is true. The gardens and the park are open every day of the year, so an Easter Monday walk in the park is still on.

March is the last of Giverny's five closed months in this guide. The Fondation Claude Monet reopens for the spring, and every subsequent page in this set, April and May, has the day trip back on the list. The exact 2027 opening date is set by the foundation and had not been published when this page was written, so if a late-March trip is close to the boundary, check with the foundation directly rather than assuming.

What to wear and pack for Paris in March

Pack for a nine-degree daily swing and fourteen wet days. March in Paris can start at frost and reach 12.3C by mid-afternoon, so layers beat a single heavy coat, and the showers are wind-driven enough that a hood beats an umbrella.

The March packing problem is variability rather than severity. A 3.9C morning and a 12.3C afternoon is a nine-degree range inside one day, and the wet days come with Atlantic wind behind them. That combination defeats both the heavy winter coat, which is too much by three o'clock, and the light jacket, which is not enough at nine in the morning. A shell over a fleece or jumper solves it.

From the 28th, when the clocks go forward, you will be outside later than you have been since October, and the evenings are still 3.9C. Anyone planning to make use of the new 20:15 sunsets should keep a warm layer in the bag rather than assuming the longer day means a warmer one; it does not.

• •A wind-resistant shell with a hood; March rain comes in sideways
• •Layers rather than one heavy coat, for a nine-degree daily swing
• •Waterproof shoes, for the highest wet-day count of the ten months
• •A warm layer for the longer evenings after the clocks change on 28 March
• •Your dates checked against five Louvre Tuesdays and five Versailles Mondays

How we chose these tours

We rank on seasonal fit first and verified GetYourGuide rating second, so the experiences that actually work in March's daylight, rainfall and opening calendar sit highest. Every price, rating and review count on this page was checked against the live listing on 28 July 2026.

1. Seasonal fit first. Each of the 26 tours we stock is scored against March on daylight hours, sunset time, wet days, temperature and whether the thing it visits is actually open. A tour that cannot deliver its own selling point this month drops out, and we say which ones and why.
2. Then rating, then review volume. Where two tours fit the month equally well, the higher verified GetYourGuide rating wins, and review count breaks any remaining tie. Both numbers are public and you can check them against the listing.
3. Nothing is invented. Prices, star ratings and review counts come from the live product page. We do not publish an opening date, closure or festival date we could not confirm from the venue itself, and where a 2027 date has not been published yet we say so instead of guessing.
4. We say what we do not sell. Where the obvious thing to do in March is not something we can book you onto, it goes in the text as advice rather than being quietly left out or replaced with a product that does not fit.
5. We earn a commission. Booking links go to GetYourGuide and pay us if you book. That does not change the ranking, and it is why the reasoning on every entry is written out rather than left implied.

FAQs about Paris in March