A cursory or even detailed inspection of literature shows that while the annual cycle of precipitation and temperature in Zambia are well understood, there is a general lack of documentation on long term trends and periodicities over the country. In this study, we extensively examined the temporal and spatial changes in precipitation and temperature over Zambia for the period 1950–2016. We used the modified Mann–Kendall (m-MK) test with the aim of eliminating the effect of autocorrelation on precipitation and temperature trends based on Global Precipitation Climatology Centre (GPCC) and National Centre for Environmental Prediction/National Centre for Atmospheric Research (NCEP/NCAR) products. Overall, significant decrease (increase) in precipitation (temperature) was evident. We further observed that, on average, precipitation has been decreasing by 1.1 mm yr−1. The highest drying rate was observed recently in the 2010s with a decrease of −24.4 mm/year. An abrupt change in the trend of precipitation was reported in 1980/1981 significant at 5% significance level. The highest amount in mean annual rainfall was 1093.5 mm reported in the 1960s while the lowest (966.4 mm) was reported in the 1990s. During the core of the rainy season, the western and southern provinces of the country are observed to generally experience negative rainfall anomalies implying more precipitation deficits in these areas. Temperature has been observed to be on the rise since the 1980s and no sudden changes have been observed in its trend over the country. Results further indicate that temperature has been increasing at a rate of 0.01 °C yr−1. The highest temperature increment (0.08 °C yr−1) was observed in the 2000s. Spatial analyses showed that temperature anomalies were positive across the whole country with higher anomalies being manifested in the 2000s and 2010s especially across North-eastern areas of the country. Findings embodied in this work provide a strong foundation for future climate monitoring and for studies that focus on examining extreme weather phenomena over Zambia.