VacationSelector

Amsterdam or Venice?

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

Your match

Amsterdam
✓ Best match
65
match

Wins on nature & day trips and places to eat with your weighting.

Venice
57
match

Wins on beaches & swimming and sights concentration 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 Amsterdam if you want range: many more kitchens to eat in, far more nightlife, and protected countryside and parks within reach of the city.

Choose Venice if you want the sights packed into a walkable centre and a usable swimming season: the sea is 4km from the centre and warm enough to swim in for four months of the year.

Scoreboard

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

AmsterdamVenice
Beaches & swimming. Venice leads by 29 points.29
AmsterdamVenice
Score4069
Swim season months04
Beaches 10 km3320
Coast distance24 km4 km
Water distance24 km4 km
Places to eat. Amsterdam leads by 38 points.38
AmsterdamVenice
Score8345
Restaurants within 2 km of centre1,957750
Effective number of cuisines within 2 km4410
Museums & heritage. Amsterdam leads by 8 points.8
AmsterdamVenice
Score8072
Museums within 10 km9857
Museums within 2 km of centre6945
Share of museums within 2 km %7079
Unesco sites within 50 km55
Nightlife. Amsterdam leads by 35 points.35
AmsterdamVenice
Score7035
Drinking venues within 4 km1,543342
Drinking venues within 2 km of centre1,078306
Share of drinking venues within 2 km %7089
Nightclubs within 4 km1143
Nature & day trips. Amsterdam leads by 43 points.43
AmsterdamVenice
Score6017
Protected land share 50 km %214
Landscape blanket share 50 km %00
Land share of disc %8270
Park area within 2 km49 hectares15 hectares
Good for families. Amsterdam leads by 11 points.11
AmsterdamVenice
Score6857
Tourist attractions within 2 km7472
Park area within 2 km49 hectares15 hectares
Theme parks within 30 km33
Sights concentration. Venice leads by 15 points.15
AmsterdamVenice
Score6883
Notable places within 2 km196464
Min wikipedia languages55
Value for money. Venice leads by 10 points.10
AmsterdamVenice
Score5868
Price level global79.264.9
Daily budget€181€155
Year-round weather. Venice leads by 9 points.9
AmsterdamVenice
Score5766
Monthly daytime high6.1 °C to 23.1 °C8 °C to 30.4 °C
Monthly rainfall42 mm to 85 mm36 mm to 106 mm
Dry months02
0255075100

Where they differ

Amsterdam has about three times as many restaurants near the centre, and a wider range of kitchens, plus many times as many bars and clubs. Around it, 21% of the land is protected against 4% around Venice, with about three times as much park space near the centre.

Venice packs about twice as many notable places within walking distance of its centre. The sea sits 4km away, against 24km from Amsterdam, and Venice has four months of sea at 21°C or more where Amsterdam has none.

Where they are alike

Museums and heritage is where they come closest: Amsterdam has more museums, but both are heritage cities, and each has 5 UNESCO-listed places within day-trip reach.

They are close too on year-round weather, on the national price estimates behind their daily budgets, and on family appeal: both have 3 theme parks within reach and similar numbers of attractions near the centre.

Which traveller are you?

If you travel for eating out and going out, Amsterdam is the clear pick: many times as many bars and clubs, three times as many restaurants near the centre, and a wider spread of kitchens.

If you want to swim and sightsee on foot, Venice: the sea is 4km from the centre, warm enough for four months, and the notable places sit close together in a walkable area.

Families and walkers do better from Amsterdam: both cities have 3 theme parks within reach and similar numbers of attractions, but Amsterdam has far more park space and protected land around it.

What the numbers don't tell you

The daily budget figures, €181 for the Netherlands and €155 for Italy, are national estimates of restaurant and hotel price levels, not measurements of either city. A capital or a heavily visited city can sit far from its country average, by more than the gap between the two national figures, so neither number tells you what your trip will cost.

Amsterdam has more beaches nearby than Venice, but its sea peaks at 19°C in August, so the count says little about swimming. Venice's warm-sea months are also its hottest, in the season when a small, dense centre is at its fullest.

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
Amsterdam
6
7
11
15
18
21
23
23
20
15
10
7
Venice
8
10
15
19
24
28
30
30
25
19
13
8
Sea temperature, °C
Amsterdam
6
5
6
8
12
15
17
19
17
15
11
8
Venice
10
9
10
14
18
23
25
26
23
19
16
13
Rainfall, mm
Amsterdam
71
63
58
42
59
71
85
84
78
81
80
84
Venice
38
36
54
78
91
75
65
74
106
89
95
60
Daylight, hours per day
Amsterdam
8
10
12
14
16
17
16
15
13
11
9
8
Venice
9
10
12
14
15
16
15
14
13
11
10
9
Sunshine, hours per day
Amsterdam
2
3
5
6
7
7
7
6
5
4
2
2
Venice
3
4
5
6
7
8
10
9
6
4
3
3

Temperature and rainfall are thirty-year climate normals, averaged over the years shown. Amsterdam: 1991-2020 normals, De Bilt (35.3 km from centre). Venice: 1991-2020 normals, Treviso / S. Angelo (26.1 km from centre).

WorseBetter

Amsterdam's warmest stretch is July and August, when highs reach 23°C, but these are also its wettest months, near 85mm each. April is its driest at 42mm, with cooler days and no swimming.

Venice is at its best in May and June, with highs of 24-28°C and a sea warm enough to swim in. September stays warm but is the wettest month at 106mm, and midwinter, while cold, is drier in Venice than in Amsterdam.

Getting there

Flying fromAmsterdamVenice
LondonLHR, LGW, STN, LTN +2
1 h 5 m
€93-112
AMS · 12 km
2 h 0 m
€46-119
1 stop
VCE · 7 km
ParisCDG, ORY, BVA
1 h 10 m
€178-300
AMS · 12 km
1 h 40 m
€68-109
VCE · 7 km
BarcelonaBCN
2 h 10 m
€130-171
AMS · 12 km
1 h 45 m
€41-56
VCE · 7 km
MadridMAD
2 h 25 m
€160-183
AMS · 12 km
2 h 20 m
€102-159
VCE · 7 km
IstanbulIST, SAW
3 h 15 m
€166-175
AMS · 12 km
2 h 20 m
€148-150
VCE · 7 km
RomeFCO, CIA
2 h 10 m
€202-212
1 stop
AMS · 12 km
1 h 10 m
€81-119
VCE · 7 km
DubaiDXB, DWC
6 h 45 m
€318-346
1 stop
AMS · 12 km
5 h 55 m
€366-421
2 stops
VCE · 7 km
New YorkJFK, EWR, LGA
7 h 35 m
€512-556
1 stop
AMS · 12 km
8 h 30 m
€637-650
VCE · 7 km
ShanghaiPVG, SHA
11 h 10 m
no fares
AMS · 12 km
11 h 10 m
no fares
VCE · 7 km
CancunCUN
10 h 25 m
no fares
AMS · 12 km
11 h 10 m
no fares
VRN · 113 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

MeasureAmsterdamVenice
Official languageDutchItalian
CurrencyEuro (EUR)Euro (EUR)
SocketsCF230 V, 50 HzCFL230 V, 50 Hz
Driving sideRightRight
Time zoneUTC+1, UTC+2 in summerUTC+1, UTC+2 in summer
Emergency number112 or 911112
Elevation-2 m2 m
Main airportAmsterdam Airport Schiphol (AMS)12 km from centre287 non-stop destinationsVenice Marco Polo Airport (VCE)7 km from centre98 non-stop destinations
Public holidays this year11 days13 days

By the numbers

MeasureAmsterdamVenice
City population921,468250,369
People per km²4,208602
Museums within 10 km10152
UNESCO World Heritage sites within 50 km55
Distinct cuisines in the centre9846
Swim season, months above 21 °CNone4 months

Where else could you go?

Every comparison below shares a destination with this one, so you can follow Amsterdam or Venice 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 2026-09-01. Typical prices can be up to 7 days old. Daily budgets are estimates from country price levels.