Amsterdam or Rotterdam?
Two destinations compared on nine measures of openly sourced data. Weight what matters to you and the verdict follows.
Your match
Wins on nightlife and museums & heritage with your weighting.
Has no clear advantage with the weighting you have chosen.
What matters to you?
Pick a travel style or drag the sliders. The match scores above update as you do.
The verdict
Choose Amsterdam if the trip is built around museums, walking between sights and long evenings out, with more of each and packed tighter around the centre.
Choose Rotterdam if you want more park space near where you stay and easier theme-park days, 8 within reach against Amsterdam's 3, and you would rather trade museum choice for that. The weather is identical either way.
Scoreboard
Each measure scored 0 to 100. Open a row for the figures behind the score.
Beaches & swimming. Amsterdam leads by 3 points.3
| Amsterdam | Rotterdam | |
|---|---|---|
| Score | 40 | 37 |
| Swim season months | 0 | 0 |
| Beaches 10 km | 33 | 22 |
| Coast distance | 24 km | 24 km |
| Water distance | 24 km | 24 km |
Places to eat. Amsterdam leads by 11 points.11
| Amsterdam | Rotterdam | |
|---|---|---|
| Score | 83 | 72 |
| Restaurants within 2 km of centre | 1,957 | 862 |
| Effective number of cuisines within 2 km | 44 | 46 |
Museums & heritage. Amsterdam leads by 20 points.20
| Amsterdam | Rotterdam | |
|---|---|---|
| Score | 80 | 60 |
| Museums within 10 km | 98 | 41 |
| Museums within 2 km of centre | 69 | 20 |
| Share of museums within 2 km % | 70 | 49 |
| Unesco sites within 50 km | 5 | 5 |
Nightlife. Amsterdam leads by 21 points.21
| Amsterdam | Rotterdam | |
|---|---|---|
| Score | 70 | 49 |
| Drinking venues within 4 km | 1,543 | 542 |
| Drinking venues within 2 km of centre | 1,078 | 378 |
| Share of drinking venues within 2 km % | 70 | 70 |
| Nightclubs within 4 km | 114 | 40 |
Nature & day trips. Amsterdam leads by 18 points.18
| Amsterdam | Rotterdam | |
|---|---|---|
| Score | 60 | 42 |
| Protected land share 50 km % | 21 | 10 |
| Landscape blanket share 50 km % | 0 | 0 |
| Land share of disc % | 82 | 79 |
| Park area within 2 km | 49 hectares | 61 hectares |
Good for families. Amsterdam leads by 6 points.6
| Amsterdam | Rotterdam | |
|---|---|---|
| Score | 68 | 62 |
| Tourist attractions within 2 km | 74 | 27 |
| Park area within 2 km | 49 hectares | 61 hectares |
| Theme parks within 30 km | 3 | 8 |
Sights concentration. Amsterdam leads by 17 points.17
| Amsterdam | Rotterdam | |
|---|---|---|
| Score | 68 | 51 |
| Notable places within 2 km | 196 | 74 |
| Min wikipedia languages | 5 | 5 |
Value for money. Amsterdam and Rotterdam are level on 58.
| Amsterdam | Rotterdam | |
|---|---|---|
| Score | 58 | 58 |
| Price level global | 79.2 | 79.2 |
| Daily budget | €181 | €181 |
Year-round weather. Amsterdam leads by 1 points.1
| Amsterdam | Rotterdam | |
|---|---|---|
| Score | 57 | 56 |
| Monthly daytime high | 6.1 °C to 23.1 °C | 6.2 °C to 22.1 °C |
| Monthly rainfall | 42 mm to 85 mm | 42 mm to 85 mm |
| Dry months | 0 | 0 |
Where they differ
Amsterdam is the stronger city for evenings out and for museums: many more bars and clubs than Rotterdam, and roughly double the number of museums, grouped tightly enough to walk between them. It also has the wider countryside behind it, with 21% of the surrounding land protected against 10% around Rotterdam.
Rotterdam's advantage within that same comparison is closer to home: more park space near the centre than Amsterdam, so green space is where you are staying rather than a train ride out of town.
Where they are alike
Weather is effectively the same trip in both. Daytime highs run about 6-23°C across the year, both get 1693 hours of sunshine, and no month falls to 40mm of rain or less.
Neither is a beach destination. The sea is 24km from both centres and peaks at 19°C, so swimming is a fair-weather extra rather than a reason to go. Both also work similarly for families, with attractions in the centre and green space in each.
Which traveller are you?
Museum-first travellers should take Amsterdam: about twice as many museums, sitting close together around the centre, and both cities reach the same 5 UNESCO-listed places on day trips anyway.
Anyone planning late nights and varied dinners is also better in Amsterdam, with roughly three times as many bars and clubs and twice as many restaurants near the centre, most of them walkable.
Families with young children have the stronger case for Rotterdam: 8 theme parks within reach against 3, and more park space near the centre, though Amsterdam still holds more attractions in the centre itself.
What the numbers don't tell you
The value figures are not a comparison. Both cities sit in the same country and that measure is a national price level, so it is identical by construction and tells you nothing about which costs less. The €181 daily budget beside it is one national estimate, not a measurement of either city.
Beach counts flatter both. The sea is 24km from either centre and never reaches 21°C, so a long list of beaches does not add up to swimming. The summer months that rank highest are also the wettest, near 85mm, so a strong July reflects warmth rather than dry days.
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.
Temperature and rainfall are thirty-year climate normals, averaged over the years shown. Amsterdam: 1991-2020 normals, De Bilt (35.3 km from centre). Rotterdam: 1993-2020 (sunshine 1991-2020, rainfall 1991-2020) normals, Rotterdam Airport Zestienhoven (3.9 km from centre).
Amsterdam is at its best from June to August, with highs of 21-23°C, and it runs about 1°C warmer than Rotterdam through the summer. July and August are also the wettest, near 85mm, so May at 59mm is the drier compromise.
Rotterdam follows the same curve a shade cooler, 20-22°C in summer, with the sea at 19°C in August. April is the driest month in both at 42mm, though highs sit near 14°C. December and January, at 6-7°C, are the weakest months either way.
Getting there
| Flying from | Amsterdam | Rotterdam |
|---|---|---|
| DublinDUB | 1 h 35 m €69-96 AMS · 12 km | 1 h 35 m €69-96 AMS · 47 km |
| MadridMAD | 2 h 25 m €160-183 AMS · 12 km | 2 h 25 m €160-183 AMS · 47 km |
| CopenhagenCPH | 1 h 25 m €171-212 1 stop AMS · 12 km | 1 h 25 m €171-212 1 stop AMS · 47 km |
| ParisCDG, ORY, BVA | 1 h 10 m €178-300 AMS · 12 km | 1 h 10 m €178-300 AMS · 47 km |
| ManchesterMAN | 1 h 15 m €145-187 AMS · 12 km | 1 h 15 m €145-187 AMS · 47 km |
| New YorkJFK, EWR, LGA | 7 h 35 m €512-556 1 stop AMS · 12 km | 7 h 35 m €512-556 1 stop AMS · 47 km |
| DubaiDXB, DWC | 6 h 45 m €318-346 1 stop AMS · 12 km | 6 h 45 m €318-346 1 stop AMS · 47 km |
| LondonLHR, LGW, STN, LTN +2 | 1 h 5 m €93-112 AMS · 12 km | 1 h 5 m €159-284 RTM · 5 km |
| CuracaoCUR | 9 h 55 m no fares AMS · 12 km | 9 h 55 m no fares AMS · 47 km |
| ShanghaiPVG, SHA | 11 h 10 m no fares AMS · 12 km | 11 h 10 m no fares AMS · 47 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 2026-09 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
| Measure | Amsterdam | Rotterdam |
|---|---|---|
| Official language | Dutch | Dutch |
| Currency | Euro (EUR) | Euro (EUR) |
| Sockets | CF230 V, 50 Hz | CF230 V, 50 Hz |
| Driving side | Right | Right |
| Time zone | UTC+1, UTC+2 in summer | UTC+1, UTC+2 in summer |
| Emergency number | 112 or 911 | 112 or 911 |
| Elevation | -2 m | 10 m |
| Main airport | Amsterdam Airport Schiphol (AMS)12 km from centre287 non-stop destinations | Rotterdam The Hague Airport (RTM)5 km from centre45 non-stop destinations |
| Public holidays this year | 11 days | 11 days |
By the numbers
| Measure | Amsterdam | Rotterdam |
|---|---|---|
| City population | 921,468 | 664,311 |
| People per km² | 4,208 | 2,080 |
| Museums within 10 km | 101 | 40 |
| UNESCO World Heritage sites within 50 km | 5 | 5 |
| Distinct cuisines in the centre | 98 | 77 |
| Swim season, months above 21 °C | None | None |
Where else could you go?
Every comparison below shares a destination with this one, so you can follow Amsterdam or Rotterdam somewhere new.