VacationSelector
The beach with the bay and the skyline behind, Acapulco
AcapulcoThe beach with the bay and the skyline behind
The Esplanade boardwalk and its palms, Cairns
CairnsThe Esplanade boardwalk and its palms

Photos: Acapulco by Felicia Navarrete, Pexels License; Cairns by Donaldytong, Public domain.

Acapulco or Cairns?

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 Acapulco for

  • prices
  • nightlife
  • beaches

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

Choose Cairns for

  • nature and the outdoors
  • day trips
  • families

What lies behind each score is written up on Cairns’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. Acapulco 80, Cairns 62: Acapulco leads by 18 points.
Food & drink. Acapulco 55, Cairns 40: Acapulco leads by 15 points.
Culture & sights. Acapulco 28, Cairns 22: Acapulco leads by 6 points.
Nightlife. Acapulco 64, Cairns 42: Acapulco leads by 22 points.
Nature & outdoors. Acapulco 50, Cairns 95: Cairns leads by 45 points.
Day trips. Acapulco 15, Cairns 45: Cairns leads by 30 points.
Good for families. Acapulco 45, Cairns 66: Cairns leads by 21 points.
Getting around. Acapulco 30, Cairns 45: Cairns leads by 15 points.
Shopping & style. Acapulco 32, Cairns 28: Acapulco leads by 4 points.
Affordability. Acapulco 74, Cairns 35: Acapulco leads by 39 points.
Live music & performing arts. Acapulco 26, Cairns 22: Acapulco leads by 4 points.
Wellness & relaxation. Acapulco 32, Cairns 45: Cairns leads by 13 points.
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What lies behind each score is written up on the two cities’ own pages: Acapulco and Cairns.

Your match

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

Too close to call, 2 points apart

Acapulco
44match

Wins on prices and nightlife with your weighting.

Cairns
46match

Wins on nature and the outdoors and day trips with your weighting.

What matters to you?

When should you go?

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

Acapulco in July

34 °Cdaytime high
24 °Cnight-time low
226 mmrain in the month
8 hsunshine a day
30 °Csea
13 hdaylight a day

Cairns in July

24 °Cdaytime high
20 °Cnight-time low
30 mmrain in the month
No recordsunshine a day
24 °Csea
11 hdaylight a day

Daytime high, °C

0°10°20°30°40°JFMAMJJASOND

Rainfall in the month, mm

0200400600JFMAMJJASOND
AcapulcoCairns

Where the figures come from

Cairns's temperatures are measured 27 km from the centre, at Green Island Aws.

Cairns 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. Acapulco: 1991-2020 normals, Acapulco, Gro. (5.9 km from centre). Cairns: 1993-2010 (rainfall 1991-2020) normals, Green Island Aws (27 km from centre).

Before you go

MeasureAcapulcoCairns
Official languageSpanish, Nahuatl, Yucatec MayaEnglish
CurrencyMexican Peso (MXN)Australian Dollar (AUD)
SocketsAB127 V, 60 HzI230 V, 50 Hz
Driving sideRightLeft
Time zoneUTC-6UTC+10
Emergency number911000
Elevation18 m7 m
Main airportGeneral Juan N. Álvarez International Airport (ACA)18 km from centre10 non-stop destinationsCairns International Airport (CNS)6 km from centre32 non-stop destinations
Public holidays this year9 days11 days

By the numbers

MeasureAcapulcoCairns
City population658,609146,778
People per km²350301
Museums within 10 km31
UNESCO World Heritage sites within 50 km01
Swim season, months above 21 °C12 months12 months

Where else could you go?

Every comparison below shares a destination with this one, so you can follow Acapulco or Cairns 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). 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 2026-11-02. Daily budgets are estimates from country price levels.