VacationSelector
The church of La Compania under a blue sky, Arequipa
ArequipaThe church of La Compania under a blue sky
Cliff-top hotels above the harbour, Sorrento
SorrentoCliff-top hotels above the harbour

Photos: Arequipa by DocSlyper, CC BY-SA 2.0, cropped; Sorrento by Berthold Werner, CC BY-SA 3.0, cropped.

Arequipa or Sorrento?

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
  • culture and sights
  • nightlife

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

Choose Sorrento for

  • day trips
  • beaches
  • wellness

What lies behind each score is written up on Sorrento’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, Sorrento 60: Sorrento leads by 52 points.
Food & drink. Arequipa 66, Sorrento 60: Arequipa leads by 6 points.
Culture & sights. Arequipa 64, Sorrento 32: Arequipa leads by 32 points.
Nightlife. Arequipa 36, Sorrento 28: Arequipa leads by 8 points.
Nature & outdoors. Arequipa 74, Sorrento 80: Sorrento leads by 6 points.
Day trips. Arequipa 30, Sorrento 95: Sorrento leads by 65 points.
Good for families. Arequipa 35, Sorrento 42: Sorrento leads by 7 points.
Getting around. Arequipa 54, Sorrento 58: Sorrento leads by 4 points.
Shopping & style. Arequipa 44, Sorrento 38: Arequipa leads by 6 points.
Affordability. Arequipa 82, Sorrento 32: Arequipa leads by 50 points.
Live music & performing arts. Arequipa 27, Sorrento 20: Arequipa leads by 7 points.
Wellness & relaxation. Arequipa 34, Sorrento 48: Sorrento leads by 14 points.
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What lies behind each score is written up on the two cities’ own pages: Arequipa and Sorrento.

Your match

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

Arequipa
46match

Wins on prices and culture and sights with your weighting.

Sorrento
Best match
49match

Wins on day trips and beaches 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

Sorrento in July

29 °Cdaytime high
24 °Cnight-time low
21 mmrain in the month
11 hsunshine a day
25 °Csea
15 hdaylight a day

Daytime high, °C

0°10°20°30°JFMAMJJASOND

Rainfall in the month, mm

050100150200JFMAMJJASOND
ArequipaSorrento

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.

Sorrento 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.

Sorrento's sunshine is measured 54 km from the centre, at Grazzanise.

Temperature and rainfall are climate normals, averaged over the years shown. Arequipa: 1991-2020 normals, Arequipa (9.2 km from centre). Sorrento: 2005-2025 (sunshine 1991-2020, rainfall 1991-2020) normals, Capri (17 km from centre).

Before you go

MeasureArequipaSorrento
Official languageSpanish, Aymara, QuechuaItalian
CurrencySol (PEN)Euro (EUR)
SocketsABC220 V, 60 HzCFL230 V, 50 Hz
Driving sideRightRight
Time zoneUTC-5UTC+1, UTC+2 in summer
Emergency number111 or 911112
Elevation2,335 m50 m
Main airportRodríguez Ballón International Airport (AQP)7 km from centre2 non-stop destinationsNaples International Airport (NAP)30 km from centre131 non-stop destinations
Public holidays this year17 days13 days

By the numbers

MeasureArequipaSorrento
City population1,008,29015,407
People per km²1,5511,541
Museums within 10 km36
UNESCO World Heritage sites within 50 km15
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 Arequipa or Sorrento 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. Tourism statistics from Eurostat, © European Union, reused under CC BY 4.0. Daylight hours computed from each destination's latitude using the NOAA solar position algorithm. Exchange rates via Frankfurter, based on European Central Bank reference rates.

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.