VacationSelector
Galena Street with the runs of Aspen Mountain, Aspen
AspenGalena Street with the runs of Aspen Mountain
Shibuya Crossing, Tokyo
TokyoShibuya Crossing

Photos: Aspen by Moroder, CC BY-SA 3.0, cropped; Tokyo by Benh LIEU SONG, CC BY-SA 2.0, cropped.

Aspen or Tokyo?

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 Aspen for

  • nature and the outdoors

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

Choose Tokyo for

  • culture and sights
  • day trips
  • food and drink

What lies behind each score is written up on Tokyo’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. Aspen 6, Tokyo 40: Tokyo leads by 34 points.
Food & drink. Aspen 45, Tokyo 98: Tokyo leads by 53 points.
Culture & sights. Aspen 22, Tokyo 84: Tokyo leads by 62 points.
Nightlife. Aspen 40, Tokyo 86: Tokyo leads by 46 points.
Nature & outdoors. Aspen 95, Tokyo 68: Aspen leads by 27 points.
Day trips. Aspen 30, Tokyo 85: Tokyo leads by 55 points.
Good for families. Aspen 55, Tokyo 95: Tokyo leads by 40 points.
Getting around. Aspen 72, Tokyo 98: Tokyo leads by 26 points.
Shopping & style. Aspen 50, Tokyo 99: Tokyo leads by 49 points.
Affordability. Aspen 5, Tokyo 48: Tokyo leads by 43 points.
Live music & performing arts. Aspen 50, Tokyo 86: Tokyo leads by 36 points.
Wellness & relaxation. Aspen 50, Tokyo 78: Tokyo leads by 28 points.
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What lies behind each score is written up on the two cities’ own pages: Aspen and Tokyo.

Your match

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

Aspen
43match

Wins on nature and the outdoors with your weighting.

Tokyo
Best match
80match

Wins on culture and sights and day trips with your weighting.

What matters to you?

When should you go?

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

Aspen in July

27 °Cdaytime high
10 °Cnight-time low
33 mmrain in the month
No recordsunshine a day
No seasea
15 hdaylight a day

Tokyo in July

30 °Cdaytime high
23 °Cnight-time low
157 mmrain in the month
5 hsunshine a day
23 °Csea
14 hdaylight a day

Daytime high, °C

-10°0°10°20°30°40°JFMAMJJASOND

Rainfall in the month, mm

050100150200250JFMAMJJASOND
AspenTokyo

Where the figures come from

Aspen 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.

Temperature and rainfall are climate normals, averaged over the years shown. Aspen: 2006-2020 (rainfall 1991-2020) normals, Aspen / Woody Creek (5.2 km from centre). Tokyo: 1991-2020 normals, Tokyo (3.6 km from centre).

Before you go

MeasureAspenTokyo
Official language-Japanese
CurrencyUS Dollar (USD)Yen (JPY)
SocketsAB120 V, 60 HzAB100 V, 50 and 60 Hz depending on the region
Driving sideRightLeft
Time zoneUTC-7, UTC-6 in summerUTC+9
Emergency number911Police 110, fire 119
Elevation2,405 m6 m
Main airportAspen-Pitkin County Airport (Sardy Field) (ASE)5 km from centre11 non-stop destinationsTokyo Haneda International Airport (HND)18 km from centre98 non-stop destinations
Public holidays this year12 days16 days

By the numbers

MeasureAspenTokyo
City population7,00414,264,798
People per km²7006,501
Museums within 10 km2192
UNESCO World Heritage sites within 50 km01
Swim season, months above 21 °C-4 months

Where else could you go?

Every comparison below shares a destination with this one, so you can follow Aspen or Tokyo 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). Exchange rates via Frankfurter, based on European Central Bank reference rates. 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. 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 2026-11-02. Daily budgets are estimates from country price levels.