Meaning
May Gray is Southern California weather shorthand for recurring late-spring periods of low coastal clouds, fog, a deep marine layer, and cool gray mornings that can spread into valleys before clearing later in the day.
How it is used
National Weather Service Los Angeles/Oxnard forecast discussions explicitly use May Gray for patterns with marine-layer stratus, low clouds and fog spreading across the coast and into valleys under persistent onshore flow. The label describes a recurring seasonal pattern rather than a fixed calendar event.
Examples
- “May Gray kept the coast cloudy through the morning.”
- “The marine layer pushed inland again, so it was another May Gray start.”
Pronunciation
/meɪ ɡreɪ/ · MAY GRAY
Tone and register
Usually descriptive, mildly humorous, or resigned. It is not an official weather hazard category and does not mean every May day is cloudy.
Visitor guidance
Treat May Gray as regional shorthand, not a forecast guarantee. For actual visibility, drizzle, cloud-clearing time, temperature, wind, or beach conditions, use current National Weather Service information.
Cultural context
May Gray is closely related to June Gloom and helps explain why coastal Southern California can be cool and overcast during a season visitors may expect to be uniformly sunny. The phrase also reflects strong coast-to-inland microclimate differences across the Los Angeles region.
Places represented
Open the reviewed place guide for each regional sense carried by this canonical entry.