VacationSelector
The Parthenon on the Acropolis, Athens
AthensThe Parthenon on the Acropolis
Titanic Belfast, Belfast
BelfastTitanic Belfast

Photos: Athens by Ranjeet Kumar Singh, Pexels License; Belfast by Nico Kaiser, CC BY 2.0, cropped.

Athens or Belfast?

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 Athens for

  • beaches
  • culture and sights
  • nightlife

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

Choose Belfast for

  • nature and the outdoors

What lies behind each score is written up on Belfast’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. Athens 70, Belfast 20: Athens leads by 50 points.
Food & drink. Athens 78, Belfast 50: Athens leads by 28 points.
Culture & sights. Athens 88, Belfast 55: Athens leads by 33 points.
Nightlife. Athens 80, Belfast 50: Athens leads by 30 points.
Nature & outdoors. Athens 64, Belfast 74: Belfast leads by 10 points.
Day trips. Athens 85, Belfast 66: Athens leads by 19 points.
Good for families. Athens and Belfast are level on 58.
Getting around. Athens 66, Belfast 62: Athens leads by 4 points.
Shopping & style. Athens 55, Belfast 45: Athens leads by 10 points.
Affordability. Athens 56, Belfast 48: Athens leads by 8 points.
Live music & performing arts. Athens 64, Belfast 55: Athens leads by 9 points.
Wellness & relaxation. Athens 42, Belfast 25: Athens leads by 17 points.
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What lies behind each score is written up on the two cities’ own pages: Athens and Belfast.

Your match

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

Athens
Best match
67match

Wins on beaches and culture and sights with your weighting.

Belfast
51match

Wins on nature and the outdoors with your weighting.

What matters to you?

When should you go?

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

Athens in July

34 °Cdaytime high
24 °Cnight-time low
7 mmrain in the month
13 hsunshine a day
25 °Csea
15 hdaylight a day

Belfast in July

19 °Cdaytime high
12 °Cnight-time low
74 mmrain in the month
5 hsunshine a day
12 °Csea
17 hdaylight a day

Daytime high, °C

0°10°20°30°40°JFMAMJJASOND

Rainfall in the month, mm

020406080100JFMAMJJASOND
AthensBelfast

Temperature and rainfall are climate normals, averaged over the years shown. Athens: 1991-2020 normals, Athens / Athenai / Pláka (2.2 km from centre). Belfast: 1991-2020 normals, Belfast / Aldergrove Airport (19.4 km from centre).

Before you go

MeasureAthensBelfast
Official languageGreekEnglish
CurrencyEuro (EUR)Pound Sterling (GBP)
SocketsCF230 V, 50 HzG230 V, 50 Hz
Driving sideRightLeft
Time zoneUTC+2, UTC+3 in summerUTC, UTC+1 in summer
Emergency number112112 or 999
Elevation74 m3 m
Main airportAthens Eleftherios Venizelos International Airport (ATH)20 km from centre173 non-stop destinationsGeorge Best Belfast City Airport (BHD)4 km from centre25 non-stop destinations
Public holidays this year15 days10 days

By the numbers

MeasureAthensBelfast
City population643,452345,006
People per km²16,4993,000
Museums within 10 km888
UNESCO World Heritage sites within 50 km21
Swim season, months above 21 °C5 monthsNone

Where else could you go?

Every comparison below shares a destination with this one, so you can follow Athens or Belfast 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. Sea surface temperature from NOAA OISST v2.1, NOAA Physical Sciences Laboratory. 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. 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.