Atlanta or Miami Beach?

There is no real contest here. Atlanta is hours from either coast, so swimming means Lake Lanier or Lake Allatoona on a hot weekend, or the hotel pool.

Miami Beach is one long beach, about 11km of pale sand with warm, usually calm Atlantic water all year. South Beach has the crowds and the people-watching, while Mid-Beach and North Beach give you more room. The water is green-blue rather than Caribbean-clear, and some summers bring seaweed.

Atlanta has the edge for eating, because its best food is its own. You get fried chicken, shrimp and grits and barbecue in meat-and-three cafeterias and soul food kitchens. On Buford Highway there is a long run of Korean, Vietnamese and Ethiopian cooking. You will be driving to much of it.

Miami Beach leans upscale, with hotel dining rooms, seafood and a Latin streak that shows in Cuban sandwiches, croquetas and winter stone crabs. The trap is the tourist menus on Ocean Drive. For real character, try the side streets, the North Beach cafés or Little Havana across the causeway.

Neither city fills a week of sightseeing, but the weight falls in different places. Atlanta's heritage is about meaning more than looks. It has Martin Luther King Jr.'s birth home and Ebenezer Baptist Church, the National Center for Civil and Human Rights and the High Museum, all in a city largely rebuilt after 1864.

Miami Beach is the reverse, a place you come to look at. The sight is the Art Deco Historic District, hundreds of pastel 1930s buildings you can see on foot along Ocean Drive and Collins Avenue. The Wolfsonian and the Holocaust Memorial are the main stops indoors.

Miami Beach offers the bigger night out. South Beach clubs with guest DJs run until dawn and pool parties start in the afternoon. The scene is glamorous and costly, with door policies to get past, and Sunset Harbour has calmer cocktail bars.

Atlanta's strength is its music. The clubs play the hip-hop and trap the city is famous for, Edgewood Avenue has dive bars, and Midtown has one of the South's largest LGBTQ scenes. The areas are far apart, so a night out usually means staying in one area rather than moving between them.

Atlanta has more varied landscape. Its tree canopy, Piedmont Park and the Chattahoochee River are close at hand, and Stone Mountain's granite dome is half an hour out. For proper hiking, the Blue Ridge foothills and the southern end of the Appalachian Trail are about two hours north.

Miami Beach is flat and built up, so the outdoors means water: paddleboarding on the bay, diving on the offshore reefs and trips to the Everglades for alligators and wading birds. There are no hills anywhere nearby.

Both cities have a fair spread of outings, and both need a car. From Atlanta the trips go to small towns and mountains: the college streets of Athens, Dahlonega's gold-rush square among the vineyards, and Chattanooga's aquarium and Lookout Mountain two hours away.

From Miami Beach the trips are shorter and more urban. Most start across the bay with Little Havana, Vizcaya and Coral Gables. From there you can head north to Fort Lauderdale and Palm Beach, or south to Key Largo, the first of the Keys.

Atlanta is the easier family city because so much of it is built for children. There are the Georgia Aquarium's whale sharks, Zoo Atlanta's gorillas, Fernbank's dinosaurs, the Center for Puppetry Arts and Six Flags on the edge of town. The downsides are long drives and summer heat.

In Miami Beach the beach does most of the work, with lifeguards along the shore and gentle water. The zoo and the museums are on the mainland, though, and South Beach's party streets are no place for children. Families tend to stay in Mid-Beach or near Surfside.

Miami Beach is much easier without a car. South Beach is flat and compact, free trolleys run up Collins Avenue and the beachwalk is good for cycling. The hard part is leaving the island, because no rail line crosses the causeways.

Atlanta works the other way round. MARTA has one useful line from the airport through downtown and Midtown to Buckhead, and the BeltLine links a few neighbourhoods. Beyond those, most restaurants and sights mean a car or a ride-hailing app in heavy traffic.

Neither city is worth the trip for shopping alone, and both are built around malls and international brands. Atlanta's best shopping is in the two big Buckhead malls on Peachtree Road, with vintage and record shops in Little Five Points if you want something rougher.

Miami Beach divides between Lincoln Road and Bal Harbour. Lincoln Road is a palm-lined pedestrian street of chain stores, nicer for an evening stroll than for buying. Bal Harbour has an open-air mall of European fashion houses. Swimwear and resort clothing are the things Miami Beach does more naturally.

Atlanta is noticeably cheaper. Hotels cost less than on the coasts, the Southern cooking and Buford Highway are fair value, and the King sites are free. Car hire, parking and attraction tickets still add up.

Miami Beach is expensive, especially for an oceanfront room in winter, and resort fees, parking and South Beach drinks and club entry come on top. Hotels in North Beach, summer rates and the Cuban takeaway windows soften the bill, and the sand itself is free.

Atlanta has the fuller programme. The Atlanta Symphony and the Alliance Theatre share the Woodruff Arts Center, the opera and ballet run full seasons and the Fox Theatre hosts touring Broadway shows. As a centre of hip-hop, R&B and gospel, the city also keeps its arenas and the Tabernacle busy with concerts.

Miami Beach has more than its image suggests. It has the New World Symphony in its Gehry hall, with some concerts projected onto the outside wall, and Miami City Ballet. For opera and Broadway, though, you cross to the mainland, and live music in the clubs means DJs rather than bands.

Miami Beach is the better place to unwind, as long as you stay in Mid-Beach or towards Surfside rather than South Beach. Large resort spas with hydrotherapy circuits, sunrise yoga on the sand and long afternoons by the pool set the pace, though all of it costs money.

Atlanta's one distinctive option is the Korean bathhouses in the northeastern suburbs, with hot and cold pools and sauna rooms, some of them open all night. Apart from these, the traffic and sprawl keep it a busy city.