Peak color lands around Oct 18 in most of Connecticut, but it moves 5 days across the state. Here’s where, and when, and how sure we are.
Connecticut’s season, place by place
Every place we forecast in Connecticut, each set on the calendar at its peak and painted by how far along it is today, Sep 25.
First: Silvio O. Conte National Fish and Wildlife Refuge, Oct 6. Last: Stewart B. McKinney National Wildlife Refuge, Oct 22.
The dashed rule is today; the solid one is the median of the places on this chart, Oct 17. The date at the top of the page is the median county, which includes the low ground between them.
The county map today
Where to go in Connecticut
The destinations we cover in Connecticut, in the order their color arrives. Each carries its own forecast and its own band, because a state isn’t one place.
- Silvio O. Conte National Fish and Wildlife RefugeToo earlyPeak 6 Oct best 5 to 8 Oct
- Great Thicket National Wildlife RefugeToo earlyPeak 17 Oct best 16 to 19 Oct
- Stewart B. McKinney National Wildlife RefugeToo earlyPeak 22 Oct best 21 to 24 Oct
When to go
Across 8 counties, peak color is forecast to arrive first in Windham County around Oct 15 and last in Fairfield County around Oct 20. Most of the state peaks near Oct 18.
Each date is the middle of the four days we’d aim a trip at, and each place page names them. We score the model against 27 long-running forest monitoring sites in this part of the country and publish what it got wrong.
Mid-October in the northwest hills, late October to early November along the coast is how Connecticut is usually described.
What actually turns
The hills of Litchfield County turn orange and scarlet with sugar maples while the lowlands glow with the deep burgundy of oaks and the purple-red of sweetgums.
- Sugar Maple
- Red Oak
- White Oak
- Hickory
- Sweetgum
Route 7 through Litchfield County, from Kent to Canaan, is Connecticut's finest fall drive, with the Housatonic River valley framed by hillsides of maple and oak.
Every county, by peak week
The whole state turns within about a week, so the dates below differ more by the trees in each county than by where it sits.
Fairfield, Hartford, Litchfield, Middlesex, New Haven, New London, Tolland, Windham
Every date on this site is a forecast: a model corrected by ground reports, carrying a measured error, published in full. Check conditions with the land manager before you travel. Last reviewed September 2026. Open the live map