VacationSelector
The Thiou canal with the castle behind, Annecy
AnnecyThe Thiou canal with the castle behind
The pagoda at Kiyomizu-dera, Kyoto
KyotoThe pagoda at Kiyomizu-dera

Photos: Annecy by Dmitry A. Mottl, CC BY-SA 4.0, cropped; Kyoto by Bert Mulder, Pexels License.

Annecy or Kyoto?

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 Kyoto for

  • culture and sights
  • shopping
  • food and drink

What lies behind each score is written up on Kyoto’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, Kyoto 15: Annecy leads by 40 points.
Food & drink. Annecy 50, Kyoto 85: Kyoto leads by 35 points.
Culture & sights. Annecy 38, Kyoto 96: Kyoto leads by 58 points.
Nightlife. Annecy 25, Kyoto 35: Kyoto leads by 10 points.
Nature & outdoors. Annecy 92, Kyoto 70: Annecy leads by 22 points.
Day trips. Annecy 70, Kyoto 96: Kyoto leads by 26 points.
Good for families. Annecy 60, Kyoto 68: Kyoto leads by 8 points.
Getting around. Annecy 62, Kyoto 72: Kyoto leads by 10 points.
Shopping & style. Annecy 35, Kyoto 72: Kyoto leads by 37 points.
Affordability. Annecy 35, Kyoto 50: Kyoto leads by 15 points.
Live music & performing arts. Annecy 33, Kyoto 60: Kyoto leads by 27 points.
Wellness & relaxation. Annecy 48, Kyoto 70: Kyoto leads by 22 points.
0255075100

What lies behind each score is written up on the two cities’ own pages: Annecy and Kyoto.

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.

Kyoto
Best match
66match

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
No seasea
15 hdaylight a day

Kyoto in July

31 °Cdaytime high
23 °Cnight-time low
225 mmrain in the month
6 hsunshine a day
25 °Csea
14 hdaylight a day

Daytime high, °C

0°10°20°30°40°JFMAMJJASOND

Rainfall in the month, mm

050100150200250JFMAMJJASOND
AnnecyKyoto

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.

Kyoto's sunshine is measured 43 km from the centre, at Osaka.

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). Kyoto: 1971-2000 (sunshine 1991-2020) normals, Kyoto (3.2 km from centre).

Before you go

MeasureAnnecyKyoto
Official languageFrenchJapanese
CurrencyEuro (EUR)Yen (JPY)
SocketsCE230 V, 50 HzAB100 V, 50 and 60 Hz depending on the region
Driving sideRightLeft
Time zoneUTC+1, UTC+2 in summerUTC+9
Emergency number112Police 110, fire 119
Elevation418 m51 m
Main airportGeneva International Airport (GVA)38 km from centre150 non-stop destinationsKansai International Airport (KIX)81 km from centre62 non-stop destinations
Public holidays this year11 days16 days

By the numbers

MeasureAnnecyKyoto
City population132,1171,463,723
People per km²1,9751,768
Museums within 10 km177
UNESCO World Heritage sites within 50 km24
Swim season, months above 21 °C-5 months

Where else could you go?

Every comparison below shares a destination with this one, so you can follow Annecy or Kyoto 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. Ground elevations sampled from the Mapzen terrain tiles via OpenTopoData, merging SRTM, ASTER, NED, EU-DEM and national sources. Sea surface temperature from NOAA OISST v2.1, NOAA Physical Sciences Laboratory. 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.