VacationSelector
The Thiou canal with the castle behind, Annecy
AnnecyThe Thiou canal with the castle behind
The Forbidden City, Beijing
BeijingThe Forbidden City

Photos: Annecy by Dmitry A. Mottl, CC BY-SA 4.0, cropped; Beijing by BI ravencrow, Pexels License.

Annecy or Beijing?

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 Annecy for

  • beaches
  • nature and the outdoors

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

Choose Beijing for

  • culture and sights
  • shopping
  • live music and the arts

What lies behind each score is written up on Beijing’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. Annecy 55, Beijing 6: Annecy leads by 49 points.
Food & drink. Annecy 50, Beijing 81: Beijing leads by 31 points.
Culture & sights. Annecy 38, Beijing 93: Beijing leads by 55 points.
Nightlife. Annecy 25, Beijing 58: Beijing leads by 33 points.
Nature & outdoors. Annecy 92, Beijing 60: Annecy leads by 32 points.
Day trips. Annecy 70, Beijing 85: Beijing leads by 15 points.
Good for families. Annecy 60, Beijing 64: Beijing leads by 4 points.
Getting around. Annecy 62, Beijing 69: Beijing leads by 7 points.
Shopping & style. Annecy 35, Beijing 72: Beijing leads by 37 points.
Affordability. Annecy 35, Beijing 68: Beijing leads by 33 points.
Live music & performing arts. Annecy 33, Beijing 68: Beijing leads by 35 points.
Wellness & relaxation. Annecy 48, Beijing 55: Beijing leads by 7 points.
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What lies behind each score is written up on the two cities’ own pages: Annecy and Beijing.

Your match

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

Annecy
50match

Wins on beaches and nature and the outdoors with your weighting.

Beijing
Best match
65match

Wins on culture and sights and shopping with your weighting.

What matters to you?

When should you go?

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

Annecy in July

27 °Cdaytime high
15 °Cnight-time low
73 mmrain in the month
9 hsunshine a day
15 hdaylight a day

Beijing in July

32 °Cdaytime high
23 °Cnight-time low
163 mmrain in the month
6 hsunshine a day
15 hdaylight a day

Daytime high, °C

0°10°20°30°40°JFMAMJJASOND

Rainfall in the month, mm

050100150200JFMAMJJASOND
AnnecyBeijing

Where the figures come from

Annecy 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.

Annecy's sunshine is measured 39 km from the centre, at Geneve-Cointrin.

Temperature and rainfall are climate normals, averaged over the years shown. Annecy: 2007-2020 (sunshine 1991-2020, rainfall 1991-2020) normals, Annecy / Metz-Tessy (4.4 km from centre). Beijing: 1991-2020 normals, Beijing (11.1 km from centre).

Before you go

MeasureAnnecyBeijing
Official languageFrenchPutonghua
CurrencyEuro (EUR)Yuan Renminbi (CNY)
SocketsCE230 V, 50 HzACI220 V, 50 Hz
Driving sideRightRight
Time zoneUTC+1, UTC+2 in summerUTC+8
Emergency number112Police 110, ambulance 120, fire 119
Elevation418 m43 m
Main airportGeneva International Airport (GVA)38 km from centre150 non-stop destinationsBeijing Capital International Airport (PEK)25 km from centre104 non-stop destinations
Public holidays this year11 days6 days

By the numbers

MeasureAnnecyBeijing
City population132,11721,893,095
People per km²1,9751,334
Museums within 10 km183
UNESCO World Heritage sites within 50 km26

Where else could you go?

Every comparison below shares a destination with this one, so you can follow Annecy or Beijing 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. 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. Exchange rates via Frankfurter, based on European Central Bank reference rates. 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.