VacationSelector
The Texas State Capitol under a blue sky, Austin
AustinThe Texas State Capitol under a blue sky
The Plaza de los Naranjos and its fountain in the old town, Marbella
MarbellaThe Plaza de los Naranjos and its fountain in the old town

Photos: Austin by LoneStarMike, CC BY 3.0, cropped; Marbella by Décio Franchini, Pexels License.

Austin or Marbella?

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 Austin for

  • live music and the arts
  • culture and sights
  • food and drink

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

Choose Marbella for

  • beaches
  • day trips
  • families

What lies behind each score is written up on Marbella’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. Austin 30, Marbella 76: Marbella leads by 46 points.
Food & drink. Austin 66, Marbella 60: Austin leads by 6 points.
Culture & sights. Austin 40, Marbella 32: Austin leads by 8 points.
Nightlife. Austin 65, Marbella 64: Austin leads by 1 points.
Nature & outdoors. Austin 57, Marbella 70: Marbella leads by 13 points.
Day trips. Austin 58, Marbella 77: Marbella leads by 19 points.
Good for families. Austin 55, Marbella 70: Marbella leads by 15 points.
Getting around. Austin 30, Marbella 38: Marbella leads by 8 points.
Shopping & style. Austin 45, Marbella 58: Marbella leads by 13 points.
Affordability. Austin 33, Marbella 30: Austin leads by 3 points.
Live music & performing arts. Austin 77, Marbella 30: Austin leads by 47 points.
Wellness & relaxation. Austin 40, Marbella 52: Marbella leads by 12 points.
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What lies behind each score is written up on the two cities’ own pages: Austin and Marbella.

Your match

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

Austin
50match

Wins on live music and the arts and culture and sights with your weighting.

Marbella
Best match
55match

Wins on beaches 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.

Austin in July

36 °Cdaytime high
23 °Cnight-time low
49 mmrain in the month
10 hsunshine a day
No seasea
14 hdaylight a day

Marbella in July

31 °Cdaytime high
21 °Cnight-time low
0 mmrain in the month
12 hsunshine a day
21 °Csea
14 hdaylight a day

Daytime high, °C

0°10°20°30°40°JFMAMJJASOND

Rainfall in the month, mm

050100150JFMAMJJASOND
AustinMarbella

Where the figures come from

Marbella's temperatures are measured 40 km from the centre, at Malaga / Aeropuerto.

Marbella 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. Austin: 1991-2020 normals, Camp Mabry/Austin City Asos (3.7 km from centre). Marbella: 1991-2020 normals, Malaga / Aeropuerto (39.7 km from centre).

Before you go

MeasureAustinMarbella
Official language-Spanish
CurrencyUS Dollar (USD)Euro (EUR)
SocketsAB120 V, 60 HzCF230 V, 50 Hz
Driving sideRightRight
Time zoneUTC-6, UTC-5 in summerUTC+1, UTC+2 in summer
Emergency number911112
Elevation149 m22 m
Main airportAustin Bergstrom International Airport (AUS)13 km from centre91 non-stop destinationsMálaga-Costa del Sol Airport (AGP)39 km from centre166 non-stop destinations
Public holidays this year13 days12 days

By the numbers

MeasureAustinMarbella
City population961,855159,786
People per km²1,2171,398
Museums within 10 km216
UNESCO World Heritage sites within 50 km00
Swim season, months above 21 °C-3 months

Where else could you go?

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

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.