El Niño Until 2027: What PAGASA's Forecast Means for Davao's Dry Months

For once, the weather story about Davao is not about rain.

In July we wrote about typhoons, heavy downpours and why Davao sits below the storm belt. This is the other side of the same climate. The Philippine weather bureau, PAGASA, now expects El Niño to last into the first half of 2027, and its latest drought outlook names Davao City itself among the areas heading for dry conditions by the end of January and a dry spell by the end of February.

What the bureau has actually said is more precise than most headlines, and it translates into a few practical steps.

What PAGASA has said, advisory by advisory

PAGASA issues its El Niño advisories monthly and publishes them on its El Niño and La Niña page. Four have come out since June.

Advisory No. 1, 9 June 2026. The first advisory said sea surface temperatures in the tropical Pacific had reached the +0.5°C threshold in May, that most climate models gave an 82 percent probability of El Niño emerging in the May to July season, and that the event was likely to persist until early 2027.

Advisory No. 3, 6 August 2026. By August the bureau said a moderate El Niño was present, would continue until the first half of 2027, and might reach a very strong state before the end of 2026.

Advisory No. 4, 6 September 2026. The latest advisory says a moderate to strong El Niño is present, will continue until the first half of 2027, and may reach a very strong state in the coming months before peaking towards the end of 2026.

PAGASA's own summary of what that means is plain: El Niño increases the likelihood of below-normal rainfall, which may lead to adverse impacts including dry spells and droughts in some areas of the country. The western part of the country can still see above-normal rain during the southwest monsoon.

What has already happened in Mindanao

The September advisory includes an assessment of August. Its rainfall map shows most areas of Mindanao below normal or way below normal for the month, while most of Luzon and western Visayas had above-normal rain from the monsoon.

The companion drought assessment, issued on 3 September and based on rainfall to 31 August, counted seven provinces nationwide in meteorological drought, mostly in Bicol and the Visayas, four under a dry spell and one under a dry condition. In Mindanao, only Misamis Oriental was listed, under a dry spell. Nothing in the Davao area was listed yet.

Temperatures were high but not extreme: PAGASA recorded 21.0°C to 37.5°C in lowland Mindanao in August, and it expects 20.6°C to 37.9°C in September.

What PAGASA's terms mean

The drought outlook uses three categories, and they are defined precisely:

• •Dry condition: two consecutive months of below-normal rainfall, meaning 21 to 60 percent less than average.
• •Dry spell: three consecutive months of below-normal rainfall, or two consecutive months of way-below-normal rainfall, meaning more than 60 percent less than average.
• •Drought: three consecutive months of way-below-normal rainfall, or five consecutive months of below-normal rainfall.

These are meteorological definitions based on rainfall. They do not by themselves mean taps run dry or crops fail. They mean the rain is not arriving in the amounts the area is used to.

The outlook for the Davao area

The September outlook marks Davao del Sur, Davao Occidental and Sarangani for below-normal rainfall this month, a reduction of 20 to 60 percent from normal. Those are the provinces immediately south and west of the city.

The drought assessment then projects, province by province and month by month:

• •By end of September 2026: dry condition in Davao del Sur, Davao Occidental and Sarangani.
• •By end of October: no Mindanao province listed.
• •By end of November: dry condition in seven Mindanao provinces, including Davao Oriental.
• •By end of December: dry condition in sixteen Mindanao provinces, among them Davao del Sur, Davao Occidental and Davao de Oro, and dry spell in seven.
• •By end of January 2027: dry condition in Davao City, listed by name, together with Davao del Norte, the two Agusan provinces and Surigao del Norte.
• •By end of February 2027: dry spell in Davao City, and six Mindanao provinces in drought, mostly in the north and west of the island.

In other words, on PAGASA's current outlook, December to February is when Davao is most likely to feel it. That window includes the Christmas holidays, when many people plan family visits and moves.

Two cautions belong with that list. It is a forecast, and PAGASA updates it monthly, so the months and provinces may shift. And a dry spell is measured against the city's own average rainfall. It is a departure from what Davao normally gets, which is exactly why it catches people out.

Water: comfortable margin, simple precautions

The most common worry is water, and here the city's position going in is strong.

In May, the Davao City Water District said its daily production capacity was 728 million litres against daily demand of about 52 percent of that. Surface water supplied around 300 million litres a day, and only about 20 percent of its production wells were running, with the other 80 percent on standby for a shortage. The city put consumption in 2025 at 375 million litres a day and asked residents to conserve anyway.

The same DCWD spokesperson was also candid that water interruptions are a reality, because of leaks and because expansion works require tapping into pipelines. Her advice was to keep a contingency supply at home in clean, covered containers at all times.

That is the practical takeaway. A building with its own tank and pump will ride out an interruption. A unit that depends on direct mains pressure will not. When you choose where to live, ask about storage the same way you ask about power backup. Our neighbourhood guide helps with the area, the viewing helps with the building.

Heat and the power bill

Less rain usually means more sun, and more sun means more air conditioning. That lands on a power bill that is already high. According to the city's report, Davao Light's residential rate rose from ₱9.71 per kilowatt-hour in December 2025 to ₱13.09 for the 11 July to 10 August 2026 billing period, driven by generation costs.

Nobody has published a forecast linking El Niño to next year's rates, and we will not invent one. But the arithmetic of your own bill is simple: more hours of cooling at a higher rate. How the bill is built, and how to keep it under control, is in our piece on air conditioning, brownouts and the Davao power bill. If you are budgeting for the first half of 2027, budget for cooling.

The haze is a separate problem

In early September a haze settled over the city. Because it arrived in a dry, hot period, it is easy to lump it together with El Niño. The official explanation is different.

On 4 September the City Health Office said the haze came from large forest fires in Kalimantan and Sumatra, Indonesia, carried north by the southwest monsoon. The environment agency's regional office, DENR-EMB XI, recorded fine particulate matter (PM2.5) at levels unhealthy for sensitive groups at its Calinan station from 31 August to 3 September. On 10 September the health office reported that both the Calinan and Digos stations had registered Very Unhealthy PM2.5 levels, and that DENR-EMB attributed the increase to transboundary haze from the Indonesian fires.

None of the official releases we read tie the haze to El Niño, so we do not either. What the city did issue was clear advice. High-risk groups, meaning pregnant women, older people, young children and anyone with heart or lung disease, should limit time outdoors. Everyone should keep windows and doors closed when the haze is heavy and wear a fitted N95 or KN95 mask outside. Outdoor workers should drink enough water and wash on returning home. The health office also said the situation did not call for panic buying of masks.

If you have a respiratory condition, it is worth knowing where you would go if symptoms worsen. Our healthcare guide covers the city's hospitals and clinics.

What to do before December

Store water now, not when the tap coughs. Clean, covered containers, enough for a few days. This is DCWD's own advice, and it costs almost nothing.

Check your building's tank and pump. Ask the administrator how long the building can run on stored water and whether the pump is on backup power.

Plan the cooling budget. Take your current bill, assume more hours of air conditioning from December, and make sure the number still fits. Our cost of living breakdown gives the baseline.

Watch the monthly advisories. PAGASA publishes one every month. The next ones will show whether the outlook for Davao City holds, moves earlier or eases.

Keep masks in the house. A few fitted N95 or KN95 masks cover the next haze episode, whatever its cause.

Time outdoor plans sensibly. Early mornings and late afternoons are the comfortable hours in hot, dry weather anyway.

What changes and what does not

Davao's great climatic advantage is that it sits below the typhoon belt. El Niño does not change that. What it changes, on PAGASA's current outlook, is the rain, and the months most likely to feel it are December to February.

The city starts from a strong position on water, a high price for power and an unrelated haze problem that comes and goes with the monsoon winds. None of this is a reason to change plans. All of it is a reason to prepare a little before the dry months arrive, rather than during them.