Best Time of Year to Visit Fiji

About the author, Michael Cottam Founder of Visual Itineraries, Michael lives in Bend, Oregon. He's an avid traveler, scuba diver, photographer, and a private pilot, and also the founder of Bright Yonder, which offers marketing tools to travel agents. He's been to Fiji, Thailand, Vietnam, Seychelles, Kenya, France, England, New Zealand, Jamaica, Belize, Costa Rica, Turks & Caicos, British Virgin Islands, Mexico, and the major islands in French Polynesia. He's been in Rotary for 22 years, currently on the board of the Greater Bend Rotary Club. Here's his LinkedIn and Pinterest.

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• Compare islands
• Airfare by month
• Travel specials
• See all resorts in Fiji
• Temperature by month
• Precipitation by month
• What's a "bure"?
• Storms in Fiji
• Scuba diving & snorkeling
• Map of all resorts & islands

Fiji is a tropical paradise...with weather to match! This luscious country is blessed with natural beauty both on the land and under the water.

Fiji wholesalers--and many of the resorts themselves--are very active when it comes to special offers, discounts, extra inclusions, etc., and so these kinds of deals are changing all the time. Most websites aren't able to keep those specials up to date--there's just too many of them, and they're changing and expiring all the time. At Visual Itineraries, we track the offers from the major wholesalers daily, and our specialists have tools that show them all the available offers and discounts for a particular property instantly.

TRAVEL SPECIAL: Fiji Orchid

The Fiji Orchid 5 nights from 1,189 per person

A sanctuary near Nadi where they can relax and refresh before or after a trip to their remote Fijian island paradise.

The Fiji Orchid is located 15 minutes drive north of Nadi International Airport and 10 minutes south of Lautoka. This is a sojourn for a discrete market — people for whom the art of travel is to pause at each step of a journey and savor the experience rather than feel rushed to catch their next plane.

Learn more about Fiji Orchid

Price includes hotel stay and all taxes and fees.

See our complete list of travel specials for the islands of Fiji.

See & compare all resorts in the Fiji islands

If you're trying to decide where to stay in the Mamanucas, Viti Levu, Vanua Levu, the Yasawas, or any of the other islands, we can help! For the 80 resorts there, we've got over 1,000 high-resolution photos, 62 videos, and even some virtual tours to help you find your perfect Fijian bure. Click here to use our Visual Explorer to check out all of them.

You're going to fly into Nadi (pronounced "Nandi"), which is one of the two main cities in Fiji (the other being Suva). Both of these cities are on the main island of Viti Levu. The tourist areas on this island where the hotels are are the Coral Coast, and Denarau Island. Here, you'll mostly find traditional multi-room hotels, which are less expensive in general than the island resorts, and tend not to have separate bures.

The Mamanucas (pronounced "Mamanoothas") are the chain of islands that starts just off the west coast at Nadi, and curves around to the northwest. This is where you'll find many islands resorts with beach bures (including Liku Liku, which has overwater bures). Some of these islands have just one resort on the entire island; some have 2 or 3. These islands are easy (and inexpensive) to get to via a quick boat shuttle from Nadi, and tend to be moderately priced. Great snorkeling and scuba diving is very close by on the Malolo Barrier Reef.

Just north of the Mamanucas is the Yasawa island chain. These islands have just a few resorts, very high-end, with lots of privacy, stunning beaches, and very small numbers of guests per resort. One of my favorites there is Yasawa Island Resort.

Fiji's second largest island is Vanua Levu, which sits to the northeast of Viti Levu. It's far enough away that you'll need to take an island hopper flight out to your resort. It's very popular with scuba divers, and in fact Jacques Cousteau's son Jean-Michel Cousteau has a fantastic resort there, called Jean-Michel Cousteau Fiji Islands Resort. The Somosomo Strait, which separates Vanua Levu and the smaller island Taveuni, has many world-class dive sites. Namale and Koro Sun are two of the other more notable resorts on Vanua Levu.

Taveuni is popular with divers for the same reason Vanua Levu is--proximity to the fantastic soft coral gardens and walls in the Somosomo Strait. Here, be sure to check out Laucala, Matangi, and Qamea.

Beqa (pronounced "Benga") Lagoon is well known for shark diving--but, you don't have to be a diver to enjoy this area, as the islands nearby (including Beqa Island itself) are home to some fantastic 5-star resorts, such as Lalati and Royal Davui.

Namale Resort & Spa has this cool list of interesting facts about Fiji.

TRAVEL SPECIAL: First Landing Beach Resort

5 nights with air from 2,852 per person

Our first guests arrived 3,500 years ago and liked the place so much, they stayed.

According to local legend, the first Fijians arrived around 1500 BC, landing on the beach at First Landing.

Today, you too can discover and enjoy this intimate, authentic Fijian resort, ideally located only 25 minutes away from Nadi and 35 minutes from Denarau Island, for your Fiji holiday. The resort has easy access to the nearby Mamanuca Islands, by boat from the resort's new jetty or adjacent Vuda Yacht Marina.

Learn more about First Landing Beach Resort

Check In: 2: 00 PM
Check Out: 10: 00 AM

Typical airfares from LAX to Nadi, Fiji

Airfares vary by season, but also day of week, and are definitely affected by holidays. The chart above shows the typical minimum and maximum fares for a economy class ticket from Los Angeles (LAX) to Nadi International Airport, by month. We gathered this data in June 2016 from FareCompare.com.

TRAVEL SPECIAL: Koro Sun Resort

Simple Wedding From $756 USD

Revitalize, refresh, renew. A native experience awaits you at Koro Sun Resort. Born of a nature lover's dream, the resort springs forth from a magnificent coconut plantation, encircled by lavish rainforests, at the edge of a stunning private lagoon. The 150 acres offers guests a welcome respite from the busy world.

Bula! During your time in Fiji, it’s a word you’ll hear often. It’s simple meaning is “Hello,” but as you’ll discover upon your arrival at the Koro Sun Resort, it epitomizes the idyllic values of the islands friendliness, personal connections and life at its most content.

Learn more about Koro Sun Resort

Package Includes:
- Flowers for the bride and groom – traditional
- Flower leis and floral tiara (garland)
- Fijian Serenades (3 people)
- Ceremony by minister

Best time of year to go to Fiji

If you're coming from North America, you should try to set out between late April to early June, or late July through August, due to decreased fares on Air Pacific and Air New Zealand. June to October are the coldest and driest months in Fiji. Cyclone season runs from November to April. Hotels and resorts offer low prices in February and March as most are vacant.

Average temperatures in Fiji

From May through November, Fiji's winter, temperatures are warm during the day--around 80 degrees Fahrenheit--and cooler at night and in the early mornings. During the summer rainy season from November through April, temperatures can reach 95 degrees Fahrenheit with late afternoon showers. Fiji offers a tropical climate with higher humidity and rain during the summer and lower temperatures with dry air in the winter. However, the winds cause climate variances from island to island. Speak with your travel specialist about weather around your resorts.

TRAVEL SPECIAL: Nanuku Auberge Resort

Nanuku Resort Fiji 5 nights from 4,908 per person

Discover shared moments with some of the most gracious, charming hosts you’ll ever meet, and explore the lush, tropical paradise they call home. Whitewater raft through black volcanic walls barely five meters apart, snorkel among vividly-hued coral, hunt for crabs in dense mangrove forest, and trek up soaring sand dunes. World-class surfing, taking in a tribal kava ritual, dining in the treetops, enjoying a private atoll picnic, training like the Fiji national rugby sevens team, and lying around on two miles of white-sand beach. And we’re just getting started.

Learn more about Nanuku Auberge Resort

Price includes hotel stay and all taxes and fees.

What's a Bure?

A bure is technically the Fijian word for a wood and straw hut. In traditional Fijian culture, there was a vale, which was the "family house", and then separate bures for the men to meet, eat and sleep.

Today, you'll find any kind of detached bungalow referred to as a bure. With the exception of the main island of Viti Levu, you'll find that nearly all resort accommodations in Fiji are bures (the main island has a number of more traditional multi-room hotels).

Bures come in a number of "flavors": beachfront, garden, and even overwater bures (at Likuliku). And Matangi has a romantic Treehouse Bure, as does Koro Sun Resort.

TRAVEL SPECIAL: Hilton Fiji Beach Resort and Spa

5 nights with air from 3,156 per person

Hilton Fiji Beach Resort and Spa is ideally located on 2.5 km of beach on Denarau Island.

Learn more about Hilton Fiji Beach Resort and Spa

Air conditioning†
All public areas non-smoking†
ATM/Cash machine†
Babysitting†
Car rental desk†
Coffee shop†
Complimentary self service laundry†
Concierge desk†
Connecting rooms†
Housekeeping - daily†
Late check-out available†
Laundry/Valet service†
Meal plan available†
Multilingual staff†
Newspaper†
Parking†
Room service†
Room service†
Security

Storms in Fiji

During the winter rainy season, afternoon showers occur with frequency. In the case of a tropical storm or cyclone, residents and travelers are relocated to safe areas. Tropical storms during the rainy season are not uncommon: the last major cyclones to hit Fiji occurred in December of 2012, March of 2010, December of 2009, December of 2007 and December of 2003.

If it rains while you're there--then it's a perfect time to sit down with the locals and try kava, a traditional drink made from the kava root. It's got a mild calming effect, and there's a little ceremony that goes with each sip you take--the locals will be sure to teach you. It tastes a bit like dirty water, with a bit of a sparkling edge to it...but it's an experience you really should try while you're there.

A little inclement weather might encourage you to forgo a snorkel trip and experience a Lovo: it's a traditional Fijian feast, a bit like the Hawaiian luau, complete with a pig roasted in an underground oven, wrapped in banana leaves. Often this will be combined with the Meke, which is a traditional story-telling dance performance, with an orchestra performing on percussion instruments.

Water temperature, SCUBA diving in Fiji

Fiji has warm water temperatures year-round although thin wetsuits are recommended for deeper dives. In the northern islands of Vanua Levu and Taveuni, the rainy season (November through April) has a much greater effect and if you really want to dive that area, you'd be advised to stick to the dry season. In the Mamanucas, Beqa, and on Viti Levu it's not nearly as much of a concern, and diving and weather in general is pretty nice all year round.

Popular dive areas:

• the Black Forest--ancient black coral trees, diverse assortment of fish and marine life, near Wananavu Beach Resort
• near Taveuni you'll find The Ledge, The Great White Wall, Jerry's Jelly, and Annie's Bommie; nearby resorts include Qamea, Laucala, Matangi, Taveuni Palms, Paradise Taveuni, Maravu, and Taveuni Island Resort
• the Great Astrolabe Reef is near Kadavu Island, and this is considered to be the largest living organism in Fiji, with tons of varieties of hard and soft corals and diverse marine life; it's about 40 miles from the major resorts at Beqa Lagoon
• Naiqoro Passage has both a wide variety of coral plus schools of sharks and barracuda
• Beqa Lagoon, near Beqa Lagoon Resort, Lalati, Royal Davui, and Shangri La, is known for shark encounters as well as brightly colored coral, and is considered one of the best lagoons for diving in the South Pacific
• in the Mamanucas, you'll find gorgeous corals, some sharks, and plenty of colorful fish and marine life, especially around the Malolo Barrier Reef; popular sites include Supermarket, Salamander shipwreck, Plantation Pinnacles, and Magic Island; there are many resorts in the Mamanucas to choose from

How we work with you to plan the perfect trip:

• We'll talk with you to find out what you're looking for, what you like/don't like, etc.
• We'll use our first-hand knowledge of the destination to pick out a handful of resorts we think you'd like
• We'll create a custom mini website for you, with photos, videos, maps, etc. of the resorts we are recommending
• We'll follow up with you to help you make your decision
• We'll go to work with our suppliers to get you the best deal available on what you've decided on.