Where the colour is now, and where it’ll be next.
26 locations, forecast on a daily calculation of current versus historical weather, webcams we measure daily, the official Ontario Parks status and our community of human reporters.
Reader photos · none in the last 14 days, showing the latest
Forks of the Credit, Escarpment
TOBY LAM · Oct 4 · 15 days ago
Hover a dot for its name, tap it for the forecast
This Saturday, October 24
Go to Frontenac, at 7.4 out of 10.
Worth the drive. Peak on Oct 24, mixed sun and cloud. All 26 weekend scores
Green is not started yet, red is peak, brown is leaves downHollow means predicted, not yet observedTrips available at this location
Kawarthas
Southern shield, later than the highlands.
Colour is at 80 per cent, with 50 per cent of the leaves down, which reads as past peak.
Reported by Source: Ontario Parks Fall Colour Report, Oct 16 · week of Oct 13
“Weather was warm in the middle of the day and the colours are patchy across the tree canopy and absolutely beautiful.”
Colour starts in the north and reaches Toronto about a month later. Drag the slider above, select a location, or play it through and you’ll see what’s peaking when.
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Been out this week? A report takes about thirty seconds and goes straight into the next forecast. Reader reports tell us what a camera and a weather station cannot, and every one is verified by a human.
Sat, October 24 and Sun, October 25 · past 8.0 is worth the driveAll 26 places, with the source behind each one
Worth the drive. Peak on Oct 24, mixed sun and cloud.
Worth the drive. Peak on Oct 24, mixed sun and cloud.
Not worth the drive. Past peak on Oct 24, mixed sun and cloud.
Not worth the drive. Past peak on Oct 24, mixed sun and cloud.
Not worth the drive. Past peak on Oct 24, mixed sun and cloud.
Not worth the drive. Past peak on Oct 24, mixed sun and cloud.
Colour from the Ontario Parks fall colour report, Oct 17, and the ontariofall.com model. Weather by Weather data by Open-Meteo.com, CC BY 4.0.
| Location | Right now | Predicted peak |
|---|---|---|
| Algonquin, Highway 60 corridor | Past peak Source: Ontario Parks Fall Colour Report, Oct 16 · 100% colour change at Algonquin | Oct 3–Oct 11 ± 2.4 days |
| Arrowhead | Past peak Source: Ontario Parks Fall Colour Report, Oct 14 · 100% colour change at Arrowhead | Sep 21–Sep 29 ± 5.4 days |
| Oxtongue River and Ragged Falls | Past peak Source: Ontario Parks Fall Colour Report, Oct 14 · 100% colour change at Oxtongue River-Ragged Falls | Sep 29–Oct 7 ± 3.4 days |
| Dorset Lookout Tower | Approaching peak Source: Ontario Parks Fall Colour Report, Oct 9 · 80% colour change at Lake St. Peter | Oct 4–Oct 12 ± 3.5 days |
| Muskoka, Huntsville and Lake of Bays | Approaching peak Source: Ontario Parks Fall Colour Report, Oct 9 · 70% colour change at Oastler Lake | Sep 24–Oct 2 ± 5.4 days |
| Haliburton Highlands | Approaching peak Source: Ontario Parks Fall Colour Report, Oct 9 · 80% colour change at Lake St. Peter | Oct 5–Oct 13 ± 2.5 days |
| Temagami | Approaching peak Source: Ontario Parks Fall Colour Report, Oct 8 · 80% colour change at Finlayson Point | Sep 21–Sep 29 ± 5.4 days |
| Killarney | Peak Source: Ontario Parks Fall Colour Report, Oct 15 · 90% colour change at Killarney | Oct 7–Oct 15 ± 5 days |
| Killbear | Approaching peak Source: Ontario Parks Fall Colour Report, Oct 16 · 80% colour change at Killbear | Oct 10–Oct 18 ± 1.5 days |
| Silent Lake | Past peak Source: Ontario Parks Fall Colour Report, Oct 16 · 90% colour change at Silent Lake | Oct 14–Oct 22 ± 1.5 days |
| Bonnechere and the Barron Canyon | Past peak Source: Ontario Parks Fall Colour Report, Oct 13 · 100% colour change at Bonnechere | Sep 27–Oct 5 ± 4.5 days |
| Bon Echo | Past peak Source: Ontario Parks Fall Colour Report, Oct 16 · 90% colour change at Bon Echo | Oct 14–Oct 22 ± 1.5 days |
| Frontenac | Past peak Source: Ontario Parks Fall Colour Report, Oct 16 · 80% colour change at Frontenac | Oct 18–Oct 26 ± 1.5 days |
| Kawarthas | Approaching peak Source: Ontario Parks Fall Colour Report, Oct 7 · 70% colour change at Petroglyphs | Oct 10–Oct 18 ± 1.8 days |
| Awenda | Peak Source: Ontario Parks Fall Colour Report, Oct 14 · 90% colour change at Awenda | Oct 9–Oct 17 ± 1.9 days |
| Copeland Forest, Oro-Medonte | Approaching peak Source: Ontario Parks Fall Colour Report, Oct 14 · 60% colour change at Bass Lake | Oct 1–Oct 9 ± 4.5 days |
| Spencer Gorge and Dundas Peak | Approaching peak Source: Ontario Parks Fall Colour Report, Oct 14 · 60% colour change at Bronte Creek | Oct 14–Oct 22 ± 2.2 days |
| Mono Cliffs and Hockley Valley | Peak Source: Ontario Parks Fall Colour Report, Oct 16 · 100% colour change at Mono Cliffs | Oct 8–Oct 16 ± 2.1 days |
| Rattlesnake Point, Milton | Approaching peak Source: Ontario Parks Fall Colour Report, Oct 14 · 60% colour change at Bronte Creek | Oct 11–Oct 19 ± 2.6 days |
| Bruce Peninsula and Lion's Head | Past peak Source: Ontario Parks Fall Colour Report, Oct 14 · 80% colour change at Sauble Falls | Oct 10–Oct 18 ± 3 days |
| Scenic Caves and the Blue Mountains | Patchy Source: Ontario Parks Fall Colour Report, Oct 9 · 50% colour change at Wasaga Beach | Oct 8–Oct 16 ± 3.3 days |
| Forks of the Credit | Peak Source: Ontario Parks Fall Colour Report, Oct 16 · 100% colour change at Forks of the Credit | Oct 9–Oct 17 ± 1.5 days |
| Rouge and the Don Valley, Toronto | Patchy Source: Ontario Parks Fall Colour Report, Oct 14 · 40% colour change at Darlington | Oct 13–Oct 21 ± 2.7 days |
| Sandbanks and Prince Edward County | Approaching peak Source: Ontario Parks Fall Colour Report, Oct 15 · 80% colour change at Sandbanks | Oct 16–Oct 24 ± 1.5 days |
| Lake Superior | Past peak Source: Ontario Parks Fall Colour Report, Oct 17 · 100% colour change at Lake Superior - South | Oct 1–Oct 9 ± 6.3 days |
| Sleeping Giant, Thunder Bay | Peak Source: Ontario Parks Fall Colour Report, Oct 12 · 100% colour change at Sleeping Giant | Oct 2–Oct 10 ± 3 days |
We watch three things, every day, in all 26 places. Here is each of the three, as it last stood at Oxtongue River and Ragged Falls.
32 of the 32 nights since Aug 20 were cold
Open-Meteo, pulled daily
68 per cent of the canopy still reads green
21 days of frames to Oct 18 · Highway 60 near Smoke Creek (Looking West)
“Noticeable fall colours from just past Minden through to Algonquin on highways 35 & 60.”
Alexis, Sep 28
Reviewed by a person before it counted · and the Ontario Parks report said 100 per cent at Oxtongue River-Ragged Falls on Oct 14
Anything we could not observe is labelled predicted. Every Monday’s forecast is frozen, and in November we publish how we did. Under the hood it is a logistic phenology model, fitted per location against ten years of climate normals, then corrected every day by a greenness index and by human reports. The full methodology is here, including what it gets wrong.
Weather · Open-Meteo, CC BY 4.0 · cameras · Ontario 511 (MTO), Windy, NAV CANADA · colour status · Ontario Parks · reports · moderated by a person
It moves from north to south. Algonquin and Killarney typically peak in the last days of September and the first week of October, Muskoka and Haliburton through the first two weeks of October, and southern Ontario including Toronto's ravines from mid to late October.
The closest colour to the city is along the Niagara Escarpment: Rattlesnake Point in Milton, Forks of the Credit, Mono Cliffs and Hockley Valley, Spencer Gorge and Dundas Peak, and Scenic Caves in the Blue Mountains. They turn later than the north, usually through the middle of October, so they are the right answer once Algonquin is past.
The Rouge and the Don Valley inside Toronto are the last to turn, often into late October.
The Friends of Algonquin have recorded the sugar maple peak on the Highway 60 corridor every year since 1973. Across those 53 seasons the mean peak is 27 September, and the record runs from 15 September at the earliest to 9 October at the latest.
That is the historical record rather than a forecast for this year. Algonquin is the only location on this site whose baseline rests on a record that long; the rest are estimated as offsets from it, and each page says which it is.
Roughly 10 to 14 days in one location, though wind and rain can end it early. That is why we check against webcams and reports rather than trusting the calendar.
Yes, under a different name. The Ontario Parks fall colour report is the province's official weekly status, filed by park staff, and it is one of the four sources here. This site is a daily forecast built on top of it: it predicts the week each location will peak rather than only recording where the colour has already reached.
Fall colors and leaf peeping are the American terms for the same thing, and this is that report. Ontario spells it colour, and everything here is Ontario.
Four sources, and every reading on the site records which one it came from and when. The Ontario Parks fall colour report, which parks file themselves. Public webcams, read every day for how green the trees still look. Open-Meteo weather, for cold nights, September warmth, drought and frost. And reports sent in by people who went and looked, each one moderated by a person before it appears.
Anything we could not observe is labelled predicted, on every chip, every marker and every week of the season slider.
Honestly, not very far. Inside two weeks the forecast is reasonable; beyond that the confidence band widens. After the season we score every prediction against what happened.
Yes, and they carry real weight: a verified report from the ground outranks the model for that location. Say where you were, what the colour was doing and when you saw it, and add a photo if you have one.
Hiking and paddling weekends run by Wilderness Union, a Toronto outdoor community for ages 18 to 45. Transport, gear and guides included.
See the adventuresOr see every fall trip in date order, with the colour forecast for each destination.
See the adventures