Seattle in January may not be the most ideal time to visit the Emerald City, but despite the winter weather, you can still have a great time.
Some of the upsides of visiting Seattle in the winter are fewer crowds, cheaper hotel prices, and a cozy atmosphere, perfect for coffee, hot chocolate and curling up by the fireplace and reading a good book.
If you are visiting Seattle in January, or during the winter, here is our itinerary and tips to help you have a great time, despite the winter gloom.
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3 Days in Seattle in January Overview
Trip Type: Couple
Transportation: No rental car. Used Uber to get around. Took Link light rail from SeaTac Airport to downtown.
Location: Downtown Seattle.
Hotel: We stayed at Hotel Max. Cute, boutique hotel just a few blocks from Pike Place Market. Small but cozy rooms with fun blend of music, art and pop culture decor. Includes daily happy hour, has a gym and bike rentals available.
Our room at Hotel Max
If you are visiting during the summer or have more days, check out our list of our favorite things to do in Seattle to plan your trip!
How to Get to Downtown Seattle from SeaTac Airport
If you do not plan to rent a car, here are your options.
Uber: An Uber from SeaTac Airport to downtown Seattle costs around $60 USD for UberX. This rate can change depending on time of day and surge pricing.
Link Rail: For $3 USD per adult one way, take the Link light rail 12 stops from the SeaTac station to Westlake station. From the Westlake station, it is about a 5 minute walk to Hotel Max.
The link rail is so cheap and quite fast, especially if it's rush hour. Definitely recommend the link rail over taking an Uber as it's so budget friendly and convenient way to get to downtown. It runs about every 10 minutes, from about midnight to 6 AM.
How to Get Around Downtown Seattle
We decided not to rent a car for our 3 days in Seattle because first, it was a really quick trip. Second, we were planning to visit around downtown, and not go too far out. Third, parking is insanely expensive in Seattle!
Seattle Weather in January
January is the middle of peak winter in Seattle and easily one of the coldest, wettest, and darkest months to visit. Average daytime temperatures are around 46° F (8° C), with nighttime lows dropping to around 36° F (2° C).
Luckily, it does not snow much in downtown Seattle, but can happen if the city's getting a winter freeze.
Instead of watching out for snow, you need to watch out for rain. Seattle rains around 18 days out of the 31 in January, and mostly consists of light, steady drizzles, but this drizzle can start from sun up to night fall.
Days are also very short, being peak winter time. Sun up is around 8 AM and sunset is around 430 PM.
Always check the weather app to plan your activities accordingly.
What to Wear in Seattle in January
Layers, layers, layers! Bring an umbrella with you whenever you go out. Although temperatures aren't as low as East Coast winter temperatures, it can be windy and if you get caught in the rain, you'll be cold and wet.
Waterproof Rain Jacket: An absolute must, especially if you want to walk or if you get caught in the rain.
Waterproof shoes or boots and warm long socks. I love my merino wool socks which keeps my feet warm but also wicks away moisture.
Hat, gloves and scarves.
Waterproof rain jacket with hood, scarf
Day 1: Seattle Aquarium, Pike Place Market, the Pier
Mid Morning: From Hotel Max, we walked about 10 minutes to Pike Place Market to browse the stalls and check it out. We spent about an hour checking out different stores and got some snacks from Piroshky Piroshky and a small sandwich from Los Agaves to eat for later.
Afterwards, we walked about 10 minutes to the Seattle Aquarium which worked perfectly as it began to rain a bit. We spent a couple hours walking through the various exhibits and even got to see them feed the Giant Pacific Octopus which was very cool. ~$50 USD per adult entrance fee.
By the time we finished the aquarium, it cleared up so we walked around the pier for nice views on the waterfront. We considered going up the Seattle Great Wheel, but it began to rain again so we went up to Pike Place Market again to get some warm and hearty Pike Place Chowder.
Afterwards, we went back to Hotel Max to warm up and rest a bit. The hotel offers a 5 pm craft beer happy hour which we enjoyed, they offered two different types of local craft beer which was fun to try.
For dinner, we Ubered to STELLA for delicious Italian food.
Highly recommend in the summer: a Pike Place Market food tour for first time visitors. I didn't want to do it in the winter, to avoid spending too much time outside since it was raining on and off that day. Summer would be a fantastic time for a food tour. I did this Pike Place Market food tour years ago, and it was really good!
Day 2: Museum of Pop Culture, Chihula Garden and the Space Needle
We spent the whole day over by the Space Needle. Since it wasn't raining and amazingly, the sun was kind of out, we walked about 20 minutes from Hotel Max to the Museum of Pop Culture.
We left in mid morning, grabbing a sandwich from Potbelly along the walk.
The Museum of Pop Culture was so much fun. We spent around 3 hours at the museum, and spent a lot of time at all the immersive exhibits. The music exhibits were especially fun, you get to play around and tinker in the Sound Lab and they have rotating exhibits since it has over 80,000 artifacts. Open 10 AM to 5 PM.
Afterwards, we went to the Chihula Garden and Glass to admire the gorgeous glass by Dale Chihula and other artists. This took about 1.5 hours.
After Chichuly, we were super hungry and didn't want to walk far, so we got pho and Vietnamese food at Pho Viet Anh, just a 5 minute walk from the museum for a kind of early dinner.
We decided to go up the Space Needle to see Seattle right before dark. Our last day predicted rain all day long, so we went up right at dusk to get some light and then see the city at night. It was absolutely beautiful and we got to see the Emerald City lighting up the winter night.
Buy the Space Needle and Chichuly combo ticket to save some $$!
For dinner, we Ubered to Din Tai Fung to get some delicious dumplings and xialongbao.
Day 3: Argosy Cruise and Seattle Underground Tour
We planned for a morning Harbor Cruise since we saw the weather was going to be good in the morning and rainy in the afternoon.
Argosy Cruises offers 1 hour guided harbor cruises, to see iconic landmarks and the Seattle skyline from the water. I absolutely loved this cruise because you really got to see more of Seattle's beauty beyond the city buildings and the narration was excellent.
One of the reason why Seattle's such a beautiful city is that it has views of all the nature Washington's known for: water and mountains and you can see all of it better from the water.
After the cruise, we stopped by Pike Place Market once more to get some more chowder (my favorite!) and then headed back to our hotel to warm up and just relax until our last activity, the Seattle Underground.
Since the weather said it was going to rain for the rest of the day, we Ubered to Bill Speidel's Underground Tour to learn about Seattle's spicy history and how the city crawled out from its subterranean tunnels to the city it is now. What a fantastic tour this was! Very funny and absolutely fascinating to walk through Seattle's early years in the ruins buried beneath the sidewalks.
For our last dinner, we went to Wild Ginger. Delicious Southeast Asian food!
Overview
Obviously summer is the best time to visit Seattle, but don't let winter scare you. You can still have a great time exploring the iconic attractions, especially since most of them are indoor.
Come properly dressed with good quality rain gear and warm clothing, and hopefully you can visit again in the summer to see the Emerald City show off its beauty and enjoy more of the outdoor nature activities.