VacationSelector
The Santa Catalina arch below Volcan de Agua, Antigua Guatemala
Antigua GuatemalaThe Santa Catalina arch below Volcan de Agua
The coastline of the Hotel Zone, Cancun
CancunThe coastline of the Hotel Zone

Photos: Antigua Guatemala by Chad Davis, CC BY-SA 2.0, cropped; Cancun by Tellez Erik, Pexels License.

Antigua Guatemala or Cancun?

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 Antigua Guatemala for

  • culture and sights
  • getting around
  • prices

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

Choose Cancun for

  • beaches
  • families
  • nightlife

What lies behind each score is written up on Cancun’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. Antigua Guatemala 6, Cancun 98: Cancun leads by 92 points.
Food & drink. Antigua Guatemala 48, Cancun 44: Antigua Guatemala leads by 4 points.
Culture & sights. Antigua Guatemala 68, Cancun 15: Antigua Guatemala leads by 53 points.
Nightlife. Antigua Guatemala 34, Cancun 70: Cancun leads by 36 points.
Nature & outdoors. Antigua Guatemala 78, Cancun 66: Antigua Guatemala leads by 12 points.
Day trips. Antigua Guatemala 55, Cancun 65: Cancun leads by 10 points.
Good for families. Antigua Guatemala 38, Cancun 78: Cancun leads by 40 points.
Getting around. Antigua Guatemala 60, Cancun 25: Antigua Guatemala leads by 35 points.
Shopping & style. Antigua Guatemala 45, Cancun 40: Antigua Guatemala leads by 5 points.
Affordability. Antigua Guatemala 67, Cancun 46: Antigua Guatemala leads by 21 points.
Live music & performing arts. Antigua Guatemala 22, Cancun 17: Antigua Guatemala leads by 5 points.
Wellness & relaxation. Antigua Guatemala 42, Cancun 55: Cancun leads by 13 points.
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What lies behind each score is written up on the two cities’ own pages: Antigua Guatemala and Cancun.

Your match

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

Antigua Guatemala
47match

Wins on culture and sights and getting around with your weighting.

Cancun
Best match
52match

Wins on beaches and families with your weighting.

What matters to you?

When should you go?

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

Antigua Guatemala in July

25 °Cdaytime high
17 °Cnight-time low
188 mmrain in the month
No seasea
13 hdaylight a day

Cancun in July

30 °Cdaytime high
26 °Cnight-time low
89 mmrain in the month
29 °Csea
13 hdaylight a day

Daytime high, °C

0°10°20°30°40°JFMAMJJASOND

Rainfall in the month, mm

0100200300JFMAMJJASOND
Antigua GuatemalaCancun

Where the figures come from

Antigua Guatemala 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.

Cancun has no weather station within reach, so its figures come from a gridded climate model rather than a measured record, and read a broad area rather than the city itself.

Temperature and rainfall are climate normals, averaged over the years shown. Antigua Guatemala: 1998-2020 (rainfall 1991-2020) normals, Guatemala Aeropuertola Aurora (23.5 km from centre). Cancun: 2001-2020 normals, NASA POWER reanalysis grid, no weather station within 90 km.

Before you go

MeasureAntigua GuatemalaCancun
Official languageSpanishSpanish, Nahuatl, Yucatec Maya
CurrencyQuetzal (GTQ)Mexican Peso (MXN)
SocketsAB120 V, 60 HzAB127 V, 60 Hz
Driving sideRightRight
Time zoneUTC-6UTC-5
Emergency numberPolice 110/120, ambulance 128, fire 123911
Elevation1,582 m5 m
Main airportLa Aurora International Airport (GUA)22 km from centre19 non-stop destinationsCancún International Airport (CUN)14 km from centre137 non-stop destinations
Public holidays this year13 days9 days

By the numbers

MeasureAntigua GuatemalaCancun
City population59,091888,797
Museums within 10 km21
UNESCO World Heritage sites within 50 km10
Swim season, months above 21 °C-12 months

Where else could you go?

Every comparison below shares a destination with this one, so you can follow Antigua Guatemala or Cancun 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). 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. Temperature and rainfall for destinations with no weather station are from the NASA POWER 2001-2020 climatology, derived from MERRA-2. 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 2026-11-01. Daily budgets are estimates from country price levels.