The simple, easy answer to this question is… YES! It does.

Hanging clothes outside in order to air dry laundry is a rewarding, sustainable method of cleaning clothes. But sometimes the weather does not always work in our favor. While monitoring temperatures and the overall weather, paying attention to the humidity may be the most important factor in drying clothes outside on an Amish clothesline or some other mounted clothesline.

Humidity is essentially a measure of the amount of water in the air. So when you hang your clothes outside, they are already wet. If it is a particularly humid day outside (and there is extra water in the air) it will slow down the ability of your clothes to get dry, even on a day where the temperature is high.

Two things are happening to your clothes when you hang them outside — water from the air is condensing on your clothes and the water in your clothes is evaporating. In order to successfully dry, you need less water in the air than is in your clothes, otherwise air drying them will take a longer than usual time. Having a breeze also helps dry your clothes out. But the main thing to remember when hanging your clothes outside is that it’s not always about the temperature outside and pay attention to other climate factors, mainly humidity levels.