UV Index 🇵🇷Puerto Rico

Puerto Rico is a Caribbean archipelago lying between roughly 17.9°N and 18.5°N, placing it firmly within the tropics. The main island is crossed east-to-west by the Cordillera Central, whose highest summit, Cerro de Punta, rises to 1,338 m, while the Sierra de Luquillo dominates the northeast. Surrounded by the Atlantic Ocean to the north and the Caribbean Sea to the south, the island combines a mountainous interior with narrow coastal plains, producing sharp local contrasts in elevation, exposure and microclimate over short distances.

A distinctive UV feature of Puerto Rico is the strong influence of the easterly trade winds, which push moist air against the mountains and generate frequent cumulus clouds, driving high day-to-day variability in surface UV. The El Yunque tropical rainforest in the northeast sits under persistent low cloud and rainfall that attenuate UV, whereas the leeward south coast around Ponce is markedly sunnier and drier. The U.S. National Weather Service forecast office in San Juan issues the official UV Index forecasts for the islands.