VacationSelector
The church of La Compania under a blue sky, Arequipa
ArequipaThe church of La Compania under a blue sky
The Scott Monument and Princes Street Gardens, Edinburgh
EdinburghThe Scott Monument and Princes Street Gardens

Photos: Arequipa by DocSlyper, CC BY-SA 2.0, cropped; Edinburgh by Carlos Delgado, CC BY-SA 3.0, cropped.

Arequipa or Edinburgh?

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 Arequipa for

  • prices
  • food and drink

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

Choose Edinburgh for

  • day trips
  • live music and the arts
  • families

What lies behind each score is written up on Edinburgh’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. Arequipa 8, Edinburgh 22: Edinburgh leads by 14 points.
Food & drink. Arequipa 66, Edinburgh 53: Arequipa leads by 13 points.
Culture & sights. Arequipa 64, Edinburgh 75: Edinburgh leads by 11 points.
Nightlife. Arequipa 36, Edinburgh 50: Edinburgh leads by 14 points.
Nature & outdoors. Arequipa 74, Edinburgh 75: Edinburgh leads by 1 points.
Day trips. Arequipa 30, Edinburgh 75: Edinburgh leads by 45 points.
Good for families. Arequipa 35, Edinburgh 62: Edinburgh leads by 27 points.
Getting around. Arequipa 54, Edinburgh 74: Edinburgh leads by 20 points.
Shopping & style. Arequipa 44, Edinburgh 50: Edinburgh leads by 6 points.
Affordability. Arequipa 82, Edinburgh 30: Arequipa leads by 52 points.
Live music & performing arts. Arequipa 27, Edinburgh 72: Edinburgh leads by 45 points.
Wellness & relaxation. Arequipa and Edinburgh are level on 34.
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What lies behind each score is written up on the two cities’ own pages: Arequipa and Edinburgh.

Your match

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

Arequipa
46match

Wins on prices and food and drink with your weighting.

Edinburgh
Best match
56match

Wins on day trips and live music and the arts with your weighting.

What matters to you?

When should you go?

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

Arequipa in July

21 °Cdaytime high
7 °Cnight-time low
1 mmrain in the month
No recordsunshine a day
No seasea
11 hdaylight a day

Edinburgh in July

19 °Cdaytime high
11 °Cnight-time low
66 mmrain in the month
5 hsunshine a day
14 °Csea
17 hdaylight a day

Daytime high, °C

0°5°10°15°20°25°JFMAMJJASOND

Rainfall in the month, mm

020406080JFMAMJJASOND
ArequipaEdinburgh

Where the figures come from

Arequipa's station stands 203 m above the city centre, so the centre is likely a little warmer than the figures say.

Edinburgh 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.

Edinburgh's sunshine is measured 52 km from the centre, at Leuchars.

Temperature and rainfall are climate normals, averaged over the years shown. Arequipa: 1991-2020 normals, Arequipa (9.2 km from centre). Edinburgh: 1991-2020 normals, Edinburgh Airport (10 km from centre).

Before you go

MeasureArequipaEdinburgh
Official languageSpanish, Aymara, QuechuaEnglish
CurrencySol (PEN)Pound Sterling (GBP)
SocketsABC220 V, 60 HzG230 V, 50 Hz
Driving sideRightLeft
Time zoneUTC-5UTC, UTC+1 in summer
Emergency number111 or 911112 or 999
Elevation2,335 m47 m
Main airportRodríguez Ballón International Airport (AQP)7 km from centre2 non-stop destinationsEdinburgh Airport (EDI)11 km from centre163 non-stop destinations
Public holidays this year17 days10 days

By the numbers

MeasureArequipaEdinburgh
City population1,008,290488,050
People per km²1,5511,884
Museums within 10 km332
UNESCO World Heritage sites within 50 km13
Swim season, months above 21 °C-None

Where else could you go?

Every comparison below shares a destination with this one, so you can follow Arequipa or Edinburgh 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. 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.