VacationSelector

Alicante or San Sebastian?

Two destinations compared on nine measures of openly sourced data. Weight what matters to you and the verdict follows.

Your match

Alicante
✓ Best match
56
match

Wins on year-round weather and beaches & swimming with your weighting.

San Sebastian
51
match

Wins on sights concentration and nature & day trips with your weighting.

What matters to you?

Pick a travel style or drag the sliders. The match scores above update as you do.

The verdict

Choose Alicante if the trip is about sun and swimming: highs reach 31°C in August, the sea stays warm for months, and there are beaches to choose between rather than one strip.

Choose San Sebastian if you want a compact centre where most of what you came for is within walking distance, protected country close by, and summer days near 23°C rather than heat.

Scoreboard

Each measure scored 0 to 100. Open a row for the figures behind the score.

AlicanteSan Sebastian
Beaches & swimming. Alicante leads by 22 points.22
AlicanteSan Sebastian
Score7755
Swim season months52
Beaches 10 km3310
Coast distance1 km0 km
Water distance1 km0 km
Places to eat. Alicante leads by 11 points.11
AlicanteSan Sebastian
Score6655
Restaurants within 2 km of centre867472
Effective number of cuisines within 2 km3126
Museums & heritage. Alicante leads by 3 points.3
AlicanteSan Sebastian
Score4239
Museums within 10 km1417
Museums within 2 km of centre117
Share of museums within 2 km %7941
Unesco sites within 50 km23
Nightlife. Alicante leads by 11 points.11
AlicanteSan Sebastian
Score5140
Drinking venues within 4 km591388
Drinking venues within 2 km of centre488338
Share of drinking venues within 2 km %8387
Nightclubs within 4 km5412
Nature & day trips. San Sebastian leads by 16 points.16
AlicanteSan Sebastian
Score4056
Protected land share 50 km %711
Landscape blanket share 50 km %00
Land share of disc %5952
Park area within 2 km60 hectares70 hectares
Good for families. Alicante leads by 12 points.12
AlicanteSan Sebastian
Score4230
Tourist attractions within 2 km135
Park area within 2 km60 hectares70 hectares
Theme parks within 30 km11
Sights concentration. San Sebastian leads by 28 points.28
AlicanteSan Sebastian
Score2654
Notable places within 2 km1889
Min wikipedia languages55
Value for money. Alicante and San Sebastian are level on 71.
AlicanteSan Sebastian
Score7171
Price level global60.860.8
Daily budget€122€122
Year-round weather. Alicante leads by 29 points.29
AlicanteSan Sebastian
Score8758
Monthly daytime high17 °C to 31.1 °C11.2 °C to 22.9 °C
Monthly rainfall3 mm to 52 mm92 mm to 203 mm
Dry months110
0255075100

Where they differ

Alicante is much the warmer city, with highs of 17-31°C across the year against San Sebastian's 11-23°C, and eleven months at 40mm of rain or less where San Sebastian has none. It has 33 beaches nearby against 10, a longer swimming season, and about twice as many restaurants near the centre.

San Sebastian keeps the sea at 0km from its centre and packs many more notable places into walking distance. More of the land around it is protected, with more park space near the centre.

Where they are alike

Neither city is a museum destination. San Sebastian has somewhat more of them, Alicante's sit more tightly around its centre, and both put UNESCO-listed places within day-trip reach, 3 from San Sebastian and 2 from Alicante.

They also line up on the everyday side of a trip: eating and drinking are concentrated near the centre in both, each has 1 theme park within reach, and neither is built mainly around children.

Which traveller are you?

If you are travelling to swim, Alicante is the clearer choice: 33 beaches within reach, sea above 21°C for five months of the year, and dry summers.

If you would rather walk than drive, San Sebastian rewards it. Most of its notable places sit within walking distance of the centre, the sea is at the edge of town, and 11% of the surrounding land is protected.

For a trip built around eating and going out, Alicante has roughly twice the restaurants and drinking places near the centre, a wider range of kitchens and many more nightclubs; San Sebastian's are close in but fewer.

What the numbers don't tell you

The two share the same value figure because it is a national price level, not a measurement of either city, so the value comparison between them carries no information. The €122 daily budget beside it is one national estimate applied to both, not a trait of either.

Alicante's beach and weather advantage lands in the weeks when most people travel: the warmest sea and highs of 31°C fall together at the height of summer, and nothing here counts crowds. September, still warm for swimming, is also its wettest month at 52mm.

When should you go?

The figures behind each month. Each row is shaded against that destination's own year, so the deepest cell is its best month for that measure and the palest its weakest. Shades are not comparable between the two rows.

J
F
M
A
M
J
J
A
S
O
N
D
Daytime high, °C
Alicante
17
18
20
22
24
28
30
31
29
25
21
18
San Sebastian
11
12
14
15
18
20
22
23
21
19
14
12
Sea temperature, °C
Alicante
15
14
15
16
18
22
25
26
25
22
19
16
San Sebastian
13
12
13
14
16
19
21
22
21
18
16
14
Rainfall, mm
Alicante
21
18
25
34
21
8
3
12
52
32
34
23
San Sebastian
151
125
119
126
122
96
92
109
117
155
203
153
Daylight, hours per day
Alicante
10
11
12
13
14
15
15
14
13
11
10
10
San Sebastian
9
11
12
13
15
15
15
14
13
11
10
9
Sunshine, hours per day
Alicante
6
6
8
8
10
10
11
10
8
7
6
6
San Sebastian
3
4
5
5
7
6
7
6
6
5
3
3

Temperature and rainfall are thirty-year climate normals, averaged over the years shown. Alicante: 1991-2020 normals, Alicante (2.8 km from centre). San Sebastian: 1991-2020 normals, San Sebastian / Igueldo (6.1 km from centre).

WorseBetter

Alicante peaks in May and June, warm at 24-28°C with very little rain. July and August are hotter still, with the sea at its warmest in August, and October stays pleasant. September is its wettest month, at 52mm.

San Sebastian works best in July and August, when highs reach 22-23°C and the sea is at its warmest. Those are also its driest months, though rain stays above 92mm, and November is far wetter at 203mm.

Getting there

Flying fromAlicanteSan Sebastian
LondonLHR, LGW, STN, LTN +2
2 h 25 m
€46-56
ALC · 10 km
1 h 45 m
€126-289
1 stop
BIQ · 40 km
ParisCDG, ORY, BVA
2 h 5 m
€85-109
ALC · 10 km
1 h 30 m
€129-164
BIQ · 40 km
PalmaPMI
1 h 0 m
no fares
ALC · 10 km
1 h 25 m
no fares
BIO · 75 km
AmsterdamAMS
2 h 35 m
€150-169
1 stop
ALC · 10 km
2 h 0 m
€196-210
1 stop
BIO · 75 km
MadridMAD
1 h 5 m
€72-86
ALC · 10 km
1 h 5 m
€76-169
EAS · 16 km
ManchesterMAN
2 h 40 m
no fares
ALC · 10 km
2 h 0 m
no fares
BIO · 75 km
BarcelonaBCN
1 h 10 m
€62-93
ALC · 10 km
1 h 10 m
no fares
EAS · 16 km
BrusselsBRU, CRL
2 h 25 m
€102-119
1 stop
ALC · 10 km
1 h 45 m
no fares
BIQ · 40 km
MunichMUC
2 h 25 m
no fares
ALC · 10 km
2 h 10 m
€203-242
1 stop
BIO · 75 km
MarrakechRAK
1 h 50 m
no fares
ALC · 10 km
2 h 15 m
no fares
BIO · 75 km

The busiest departure cities for these two, with a place kept for each other part of the world. Busiest means arriving passengers where an official count exists, and where none does, the number of non-stop services flown: official route statistics are published by the European reporting countries and by nobody else, so a table ranked on them alone would offer a reader in New York or Tokyo ten European cities. Flying times are estimated from the distance between airports, and every row is a city flown non-stop to both. Where the typical offer connects anyway, the stops are shown. Under each figure is the airport the flight lands at and how far that is from the centre, because the nearest airport is not always the one a route is flown to. Where both columns name the same airport it is one flight, and the difference between the two is the distance printed beside it. Typical return fares for 2026-08 to 2026-10, cached market data up to 7 days old. The figure is the middle half of the offers found, so a single price means they agreed and a range means they did not; for a typical route that middle half spans about a quarter of the median, and for the least settled routes rather more than the median itself.

Before you go

MeasureAlicanteSan Sebastian
Official languageSpanishSpanish
CurrencyEuro (EUR)Euro (EUR)
SocketsCF230 V, 50 HzCF230 V, 50 Hz
Driving sideRightRight
Time zoneUTC+1, UTC+2 in summerUTC+1, UTC+2 in summer
Emergency number112112
Elevation3 m6 m
Main airportAlicante-Elche Miguel Hernández Airport (ALC)10 km from centre124 non-stop destinationsSan Sebastián Airport (EAS)16 km from centre11 non-stop destinations
Public holidays this year13 days13 days

By the numbers

MeasureAlicanteSan Sebastian
City population366,221189,866
People per km²1,8193,118
Museums within 10 km814
UNESCO World Heritage sites within 50 km23
Distinct cuisines in the centre5245
Swim season, months above 21 °C5 months2 months

Where else could you go?

Every comparison below shares a destination with this one, so you can follow Alicante or San Sebastian somewhere new.

Browse every destination we have measured

Sources

© OpenStreetMap contributors, data available under the Open Database Licence. Place counts include data from Overture Maps Foundation (CDLA Permissive 2.0), assembled from Meta, Microsoft, Foursquare and other providers. Notable-place counts from Wikidata (CC0), weighted by Wikipedia language editions. Structured data from Wikidata (CC0). Weather data by Meteostat. Meteorological data provided by NOAA, DWD and others. 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). 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. Typical fares from Travelpayouts (Aviasales data). Route-level air passenger statistics from Eurostat, © European Union, reused under CC BY 4.0. Exchange rates via Frankfurter, based on European Central Bank reference rates.

Scores follow rubric v2; snapshot generated 2026-08-31. Typical prices can be up to 7 days old. Daily budgets are estimates from country price levels.