Warm places to travel in December from the USA

The forecast at home has turned, the heating is on, and you have a stretch of days around the holidays that you would rather spend somewhere you can feel the sun on your arms. So you open a search, type "warm places to travel in December," and get a list of beaches with no sense of which ones are actually warm, which need a passport, and which you could reasonably pull off.

The honest short answer: in December the reliably warm, easy options from the US split into two groups. The ones you can reach without a passport, Florida, the desert Southwest, Hawaii and Puerto Rico, and the ones abroad, mainly Mexico and the Caribbean, that need a little more lead time. Below is where the numbers actually hold up, what "warm" means in each, and the part nobody puts on the list: who you go with when your people are busy with their own holidays.

Warm places to travel in December in the USA, no passport needed

If you are a US citizen, the simplest trips need nothing but an ID, and a few of them are genuinely warm in December.

South Florida is the default for a reason. Miami averages a December high of about 78°F and a low around 64°F, according to NOAA's 1991–2020 climate normals (via Wikipedia, checked October 31, 2026). That is swim-in-the-afternoon, light-layer-at-night weather, and the Keys run a touch warmer still.

The desert Southwest is the dry-heat alternative. Phoenix averages a December high near 66°F and a low around 45°F on the same NOAA normals: warm in the sun, cool after dark, and ideal if you want hiking and red rock over a beach.

Puerto Rico is the quiet winner, because it is a US territory, so US citizens travel there without a passport, and it is properly tropical: San Juan averages a December high of about 84°F and a low near 73°F. Hawaii is the other no-passport tropics, with Honolulu averaging a December high around 82°F and a low near 69°F, at the cost of the longest flight on this list.

Warm places to travel in December abroad

If you have a passport and a week, the map opens up. Mexico's Caribbean coast and Pacific resorts, and the wider Caribbean, are the closest reliable heat, and December sits in their drier, more settled season. Central America, Costa Rica above all, pairs warmth with more to do than lie down. These need earlier booking than a domestic trip, because holiday flights climb first and fill up.

One practical note for any trip outside the US: sort your data before you fly rather than paying roaming rates or hunting for wifi. An eSIM like Airalo lets you land with a working phone, which matters more when you are coordinating a group across a resort. For deciding which country fits the trip you want, the best places to travel solo beyond Europe weighs them up.

Warm places to travel in December without a passport

Because this is such a common search, it is worth saying plainly. Without a passport, as a US citizen, your warm December options are the mainland sun spots, Florida and the southern desert, plus the two tropical ones that are still US soil: Puerto Rico and the US Virgin Islands, and the state of Hawaii. Everything genuinely tropical and foreign, Mexico, the Caribbean islands, Central America, needs the passport. If yours is expired, that decision makes itself, and Puerto Rico is the closest thing to "abroad" you can reach on a driver's license.

This is a different trip from the UK-style winter-sun break in where to go in November and December, which is written around the Canary Islands and southern Spain; from the US, the math points south and west instead.

Who to go with when everyone is busy with the holidays

December is the hardest month to get company, because everyone's calendar is already spoken for. You can go alone, and a warm, walkable place is a good one to do it in. But if the part that stops you is picturing the fourth dinner on your own, there is a middle ground that is not "cancel" and not "go it completely alone."

That is what TravelMatch does. You post the trip you have in mind, with a destination and dates, and people who are free those days ask to join, or you join a trip someone else has already posted. Before you say yes, you see each person's profile: their pace, their budget, the kind of place they like to stay and the age range they prefer to travel with, plus your affinity percentage. The reviews on a profile can only be written by people who have actually traveled with that person. Whoever created the trip decides who comes, and once the group is formed the chat, the itinerary, the polls and the shared expenses sit in one place. It is free and it books nothing: everyone sorts their own flights and room. The alternative is an organized group tour or a package, with fixed dates and a fixed destination, which suits people who would rather not organize a thing. If you want help thinking through who to travel with when your friends can't, that goes deeper on the solo-but-not-alone version.

Booking it, and splitting it

Warm December trips reward booking in the right order. Beds first, because the good central places over the holidays go early, and Booking.com is a simple way to line up options before anyone commits. If you are in Florida, the Keys or the desert and plan to range around, a car is usually the unlock, and Discover Cars compares the rental companies in one place. For the day you want a reef snorkel, a sunset sail or a desert tour, GetYourGuide lets you reserve ahead instead of deciding in a parking lot. Then, for keeping a shared pot fair across a few days, how to split travel costs fairly is the honest method.

Choosing by days and budget

With a long weekend, stay no-passport and close: Florida, Phoenix or San Juan on a direct flight. With a full week, that is when Hawaii or a trip abroad pays off, because you are not spending half of it in transit. On a tight budget, the cheapest warmth is usually mainland, out of a nearby hub, in the first half of December before the holiday peak.

The coldest, grayest stretch of the year is exactly when a few warm days are worth the most. The only trip that never warms you up is the one you keep meaning to book.

On TravelMatch you can post the December trip you have in mind, with the destination and dates, and let people who are free those days ask to join. You see how each person travels before deciding anything. It is free.

→ Find who to go with · Free, in a minute.

Reviewed in October 2026. December average temperatures from NOAA's 1991–2020 U.S. climate normals as tabulated on Wikipedia for Miami, Phoenix, San Juan and Honolulu, checked on October 31, 2026. Search phrases from Google's autocomplete in the US, October 2026. Normals are long-run averages, not a forecast for any given day, and prices change over the holidays, so check before you book.

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