VacationSelector
Your rainbow panorama on top of ARoS, Aarhus
AarhusYour rainbow panorama on top of ARoS
The pastel houses of Rainbow Row, Charleston
CharlestonThe pastel houses of Rainbow Row

Photos: Aarhus by Mozzihh, CC BY-SA 4.0, cropped; Charleston by NealVickers, CC BY-SA 4.0, cropped.

Aarhus or Charleston?

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

  • getting around
  • live music and the arts
  • families

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

Choose Charleston for

  • beaches
  • food and drink
  • shopping

What lies behind each score is written up on Charleston’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, Charleston 72: Charleston leads by 38 points.
Food & drink. Aarhus 57, Charleston 72: Charleston leads by 15 points.
Culture & sights. Aarhus 61, Charleston 64: Charleston leads by 3 points.
Nightlife. Aarhus 45, Charleston 44: Aarhus leads by 1 points.
Nature & outdoors. Aarhus 56, Charleston 55: Aarhus leads by 1 points.
Day trips. Aarhus 63, Charleston 62: Aarhus leads by 1 points.
Good for families. Aarhus 70, Charleston 60: Aarhus leads by 10 points.
Getting around. Aarhus 75, Charleston 46: Aarhus leads by 29 points.
Shopping & style. Aarhus 47, Charleston 55: Charleston leads by 8 points.
Affordability. Aarhus 22, Charleston 27: Charleston leads by 5 points.
Live music & performing arts. Aarhus 55, Charleston 42: Aarhus leads by 13 points.
Wellness & relaxation. Aarhus 44, Charleston 40: Aarhus leads by 4 points.
0255075100

What lies behind each score is written up on the two cities’ own pages: Aarhus and Charleston.

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 getting around and live music and the arts with your weighting.

Charleston
53match

Wins on beaches and food and drink 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
17 °Csea
17 hdaylight a day

Charleston in July

33 °Cdaytime high
23 °Cnight-time low
167 mmrain in the month
28 °Csea
14 hdaylight a day

Daytime high, °C

0°10°20°30°40°JFMAMJJASOND

Rainfall in the month, mm

050100150200JFMAMJJASOND
AarhusCharleston

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). Charleston: 1991-2020 normals, Charleston Airport (16.1 km from centre).

Before you go

MeasureAarhusCharleston
Official languageDanish-
CurrencyDanish Krone (DKK)US Dollar (USD)
SocketsCEFK230 V, 50 HzAB120 V, 60 Hz
Driving sideRightRight
Time zoneUTC+1, UTC+2 in summerUTC-5, UTC-4 in summer
Emergency number112911
Elevation6 m6 m
Main airportAarhus Airport (AAR)30 km from centre15 non-stop destinationsCharleston International Airport (CHS)16 km from centre56 non-stop destinations
Public holidays this year14 days12 days

By the numbers

MeasureAarhusCharleston
City population290,598150,227
People per km²3,193532
Museums within 10 km1719
UNESCO World Heritage sites within 50 km00
Swim season, months above 21 °CNone6 months

Where else could you go?

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