Peak color lands around Oct 14 in most of New York, but it moves 26 days across the state. Here’s where, and when, and how sure we are.
New York’s season, place by place
Every place we forecast in New York, each set on the calendar at its peak and painted by how far along it is today, Sep 25.
First: Finger Lakes National Forest, Oct 14. Last: Congressman Lester Wolff Oyster Bay National Wildlife Refuge, Oct 25.
The dashed rule is today; the solid one is the median of the places on this chart, Oct 20. 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 New York
The destinations we cover in New York, in the order their color arrives. Each carries its own forecast and its own band, because a state isn’t one place.
- Too earlyPeak 14 Oct, oak 21 Oct best 13 to 16 Oct
- Saratoga National Historical ParkToo earlyPeak 14 Oct, oak 18 Oct best 13 to 16 Oct
- Iroquois National Wildlife RefugeToo earlyPeak 15 Oct best 14 to 17 Oct
- Montezuma National Wildlife RefugeToo earlyPeak 15 Oct best 14 to 17 Oct
- Home of Franklin D. Roosevelt National Historic SiteToo earlyPeak 17 Oct best 16 to 19 Oct
- Great Thicket National Wildlife RefugeToo earlyPeak 17 Oct best 16 to 19 Oct
- Vanderbilt Mansion National Historic SiteToo earlyPeak 17 Oct best 16 to 19 Oct
- Eleanor Roosevelt National Historic SiteToo earlyPeak 17 Oct best 16 to 19 Oct
- Shawangunk Grasslands National Wildlife RefugeToo earlyPeak 18 Oct best 17 to 20 Oct
- Wallkill River National Wildlife RefugeToo earlyPeak 20 Oct best 19 to 22 Oct
- Elizabeth Alexandra Morton National Wildlife RefugeToo earlyPeak 22 Oct best 21 to 24 Oct
- Too earlyPeak 23 Oct best 22 to 25 Oct
- Otis Pike Fire Island High Dune Wilderness AreaToo earlyPeak 23 Oct best 22 to 25 Oct
- Seatuck National Wildlife RefugeToo earlyPeak 23 Oct best 22 to 25 Oct
- Too earlyPeak 24 Oct best 23 to 26 Oct
- Wertheim National Wildlife RefugeToo earlyPeak 24 Oct best 23 to 26 Oct
- Oyster Bay National Wildlife RefugeToo earlyPeak 25 Oct best 24 to 27 Oct
- Congressman Lester Wolff Oyster Bay National Wildlife RefugeToo earlyPeak 25 Oct best 24 to 27 Oct
When to go
Across 62 counties, peak color is forecast to arrive first in Essex County around Sep 30 and last in Richmond County around Oct 26. Most of the state peaks near Oct 14.
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.
This autumn is running 1 day late in New York. September has run warmer than the 1991 to 2020 normal so far, and the dates above already include that. It’s a real signal but a modest one: temperature explains under a tenth of how much peak color moves year to year.
2 of 62 counties here are corrected by people who have actually looked at the trees this season. 15 reports from official state sources have moved those dates off the model and narrowed their windows. Counties with neither keep the model forecast and say so. Which is which is marked in the table below.
Late September in the High Peaks, early-to-mid October in the Catskills, late October in the Hudson Valley is how New York is usually described.
What actually turns
The Adirondacks produce color as vivid as anywhere in New England, with sugar maples blazing orange across mountainsides of birch gold and beech bronze, all reflected in thousands of lakes.
- Sugar Maple
- Red Maple
- American Beech
- Yellow Birch
- Red Oak
The Adirondacks from Lake Placid to Old Forge peak in the first week of October, and the combination of lake reflections and mountain color is as good as any fall drive in the country.
Worth the drive
Essex County contains the Adirondack High Peaks, including Mount Marcy, and the Lake Placid region. The Adirondacks are the largest publicly protected wilderness area in the contiguous United States, and the fall color reflected in hundreds of lakes and ponds creates a landscape of extraordinary beauty. The High Peaks color in late September, and the lake corridors fill in through mid-October.
Delaware County in the western Catskills is the less-visited side of the range, and that is precisely its appeal. The Pepacton Reservoir, rolling dairy farms, and covered bridges set against hardwood-covered mountainsides make this the pastoral counterpart to the more dramatic eastern Catskills. Peak color typically arrives in the second week of October.
Livingston County is home to Letchworth State Park, the Grand Canyon of the East. The Genesee River has cut a gorge up to 550 feet deep through layers of shale and sandstone, and the hardwood forest lining both rims turns vivid orange and red in early-to-mid October. Three major waterfalls within the gorge, each framed by walls of color, make this one of the most photogenic fall destinations in the entire Northeast.
Sullivan County sits where the Catskills meet the Delaware River valley, and the eastern portion of the county climbs into genuine mountain terrain. The Upper Delaware Scenic River forms the western border, and the combination of river views and mountain color makes this an underrated fall destination within easy reach of New York City.
Every county, by peak week
Elevation does most of the work here. Color runs down a mountain at roughly a day per 100 meters, so a ridge and the valley below it can be a week or two apart in the same county. On the Great Lakes shore the water adds its own delay, the shoreline itself a week or more behind the same trees inland.
Clinton regional, Essex corrected, Franklin regional, Hamilton
Albany, Allegany, Cattaraugus, Chenango, Cortland, Delaware, Fulton, Greene, Herkimer, Lewis, Madison, Montgomery, Oneida, Onondaga, Ontario corrected, Oswego, Otsego, Rensselaer, Saratoga, Schenectady, Schoharie, St. Lawrence, Tompkins, Warren regional, Washington, Wyoming
Broome, Cayuga, Chautauqua, Chemung, Columbia, Dutchess, Erie, Genesee, Jefferson, Livingston, Monroe, Niagara, Orange, Orleans, Putnam, Schuyler, Seneca, Steuben, Sullivan, Tioga, Ulster, Wayne, Westchester, Yates
Bronx, Kings, Nassau, New York, Queens, Richmond, Rockland, Suffolk
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