VacationSelector
Your rainbow panorama on top of ARoS, Aarhus
AarhusYour rainbow panorama on top of ARoS
Yellow colonial houses in the walled city, Cartagena
CartagenaYellow colonial houses in the walled city

Photos: Aarhus by Mozzihh, CC BY-SA 4.0, cropped; Cartagena by Dr. Thomas Liptak, CC BY-SA 4.0, cropped.

Aarhus or Cartagena?

Our verdict in twelve categories, each scored against the same fixed benchmark cities, and the climate month by month, so you can choose for your trip.

Choose Aarhus for

  • day trips
  • families
  • getting around

What lies behind each score is written up on Aarhus’s own page.

Choose Cartagena for

  • prices
  • beaches
  • nightlife

What lies behind each score is written up on Cartagena’s own page.

Scoreboard

Twelve categories on one fixed scale from 0 to 100. The shaded stretch is the gap between the two.

Beaches & swimming. Aarhus 34, Cartagena 70: Cartagena leads by 36 points.
Food & drink. Aarhus 57, Cartagena 62: Cartagena leads by 5 points.
Culture & sights. Aarhus 61, Cartagena 68: Cartagena leads by 7 points.
Nightlife. Aarhus 45, Cartagena 70: Cartagena leads by 25 points.
Nature & outdoors. Aarhus 56, Cartagena 46: Aarhus leads by 10 points.
Day trips. Aarhus 63, Cartagena 33: Aarhus leads by 30 points.
Good for families. Aarhus 70, Cartagena 40: Aarhus leads by 30 points.
Getting around. Aarhus 75, Cartagena 54: Aarhus leads by 21 points.
Shopping & style. Aarhus 47, Cartagena 48: Cartagena leads by 1 points.
Affordability. Aarhus 22, Cartagena 60: Cartagena leads by 38 points.
Live music & performing arts. Aarhus 55, Cartagena 40: Aarhus leads by 15 points.
Wellness & relaxation. Aarhus 44, Cartagena 40: Aarhus leads by 4 points.
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What lies behind each score is written up on the two cities’ own pages: Aarhus and Cartagena.

Your match

Pick a travel style or drag the sliders, and both match scores follow your weighting.

Too close to call, 1 point apart

Aarhus
52match

Wins on day trips and families with your weighting.

Cartagena
53match

Wins on prices and beaches with your weighting.

What matters to you?

When should you go?

Pick your month. The climate figures are measured averages, not a forecast.

Aarhus in July

22 °Cdaytime high
13 °Cnight-time low
66 mmrain in the month
No recordsunshine a day
17 °Csea
17 hdaylight a day

Cartagena in July

31 °Cdaytime high
26 °Cnight-time low
124 mmrain in the month
7 hsunshine a day
30 °Csea
13 hdaylight a day

Daytime high, °C

0°10°20°30°40°JFMAMJJASOND

Rainfall in the month, mm

050100150200250JFMAMJJASOND
AarhusCartagena

Where the figures come from

Aarhus's temperatures are measured 30 km from the centre, at Tirstrup.

Aarhus has no rain gauge within 25 km of the centre, so its rainfall comes from a gridded climate dataset read at the city rather than from a gauge further away.

Temperature and rainfall are climate normals, averaged over the years shown. Aarhus: 1991-2020 normals, Tirstrup (29.8 km from centre). Cartagena: 1991-2020 normals, Cartagena / Rafael Nunez (3.1 km from centre).

Before you go

MeasureAarhusCartagena
Official languageDanishSpanish
CurrencyDanish Krone (DKK)Colombian Peso (COP)
SocketsCEFK230 V, 50 HzAB110 V, 60 Hz
Driving sideRightRight
Time zoneUTC+1, UTC+2 in summerUTC-5
Emergency number112123
Elevation6 m2 m
Main airportAarhus Airport (AAR)30 km from centre15 non-stop destinationsRafael Nuñez International Airport (CTG)2 km from centre26 non-stop destinations
Public holidays this year14 days19 days

By the numbers

MeasureAarhusCartagena
City population290,598914,552
People per km²3,1931,599
Museums within 10 km172
UNESCO World Heritage sites within 50 km01
Swim season, months above 21 °CNone12 months

Where else could you go?

Every comparison below shares a destination with this one, so you can follow Aarhus or Cartagena somewhere new.

Browse every destination

Sources

Structured data from Wikidata (CC0). Weather data by Meteostat. Meteorological data provided by NOAA, DWD and others. Rainfall where no rain gauge is within 25 km is from the TerraClimate 1991-2020 climatology (Abatzoglou et al. 2018, Scientific Data), read at the city. Sea surface temperature from NOAA OISST v2.1, NOAA Physical Sciences Laboratory. Airport data from OurAirports (public domain). Tourism statistics from Eurostat, © European Union, reused under CC BY 4.0. Public holidays from Nager.Date (MIT). Exchange rates via Frankfurter, based on European Central Bank reference rates. Non-stop route lists from the "Airlines and destinations" tables on English Wikipedia airport articles, by Wikipedia contributors, reused under CC BY-SA 4.0. Currency from the ISO 4217 register maintained by SIX, cross-checked against country data from GeoNames (CC BY 4.0). Price level from World Bank open data (PPP conversion factor for private consumption and official exchange rate), CC BY 4.0. Time zones from GeoNames (CC BY 4.0); clock offsets computed from the IANA time zone database. Daylight hours computed from each destination's latitude using the NOAA solar position algorithm.

Category scores are our editorial verdict under rubric v3, each placed against the same fixed benchmark cities; the climate figures are measured. How the scores are set. Snapshot generated 2026-10-31. Daily budgets are estimates from country price levels.