Avignon or Genoa?
Two destinations compared on nine measures of openly sourced data. Weight what matters to you and the verdict follows.
Your match
Wins on nature & day trips and good for families with your weighting.
Wins on beaches & swimming and nightlife with your weighting.
What matters to you?
Pick a travel style or drag the sliders. The match scores above update as you do.
The verdict
Choose Genoa if the sea matters: dozens of beaches within reach, water warm enough to swim in for four months, a denser centre to explore on foot and much more open after dark.
Choose Avignon if you plan to drive out from your base, to protected countryside, UNESCO-listed places and theme parks, and if you want hotter, sunnier summer days, with the trade-off of no real coast.
Scoreboard
Each measure scored 0 to 100. Open a row for the figures behind the score.
Beaches & swimming. Genoa leads by 73 points.73
| Avignon | Genoa | |
|---|---|---|
| Score | 0 | 73 |
| Swim season months | 0 | 4 |
| Beaches 10 km | 1 | 37 |
| Coast distance | 55 km | 0 km |
| Water distance | — | 0 km |
Places to eat. Genoa leads by 6 points.6
| Avignon | Genoa | |
|---|---|---|
| Score | 44 | 50 |
| Restaurants within 2 km of centre | 336 | 691 |
| Effective number of cuisines within 2 km | 18 | 14 |
Museums & heritage. Avignon and Genoa are level on 55.
| Avignon | Genoa | |
|---|---|---|
| Score | 55 | 55 |
| Museums within 10 km | 17 | 47 |
| Museums within 2 km of centre | 16 | 33 |
| Share of museums within 2 km % | 94 | 70 |
| Unesco sites within 50 km | 6 | 1 |
Nightlife. Genoa leads by 34 points.34
| Avignon | Genoa | |
|---|---|---|
| Score | 16 | 50 |
| Drinking venues within 4 km | 115 | 637 |
| Drinking venues within 2 km of centre | 97 | 419 |
| Share of drinking venues within 2 km % | 84 | 66 |
| Nightclubs within 4 km | 4 | 17 |
Nature & day trips. Avignon leads by 9 points.9
| Avignon | Genoa | |
|---|---|---|
| Score | 44 | 35 |
| Protected land share 50 km % | 36 | 8 |
| Landscape blanket share 50 km % | 31 | 0 |
| Land share of disc % | 100 | 61 |
| Park area within 2 km | 23 hectares | 29 hectares |
Good for families. Avignon leads by 4 points.4
| Avignon | Genoa | |
|---|---|---|
| Score | 42 | 38 |
| Tourist attractions within 2 km | 15 | 21 |
| Park area within 2 km | 23 hectares | 29 hectares |
| Theme parks within 30 km | 4 | 0 |
Sights concentration. Genoa leads by 21 points.21
| Avignon | Genoa | |
|---|---|---|
| Score | 40 | 61 |
| Notable places within 2 km | 40 | 130 |
| Min wikipedia languages | 5 | 5 |
Value for money. Genoa leads by 6 points.6
| Avignon | Genoa | |
|---|---|---|
| Score | 62 | 68 |
| Price level global | 73.7 | 64.9 |
| Daily budget | €160 | €155 |
Year-round weather. Genoa leads by 3 points.3
| Avignon | Genoa | |
|---|---|---|
| Score | 70 | 73 |
| Monthly daytime high | 11.2 °C to 31.2 °C | 11.7 °C to 27.9 °C |
| Monthly rainfall | 34 mm to 111 mm | 12 mm to 122 mm |
| Dry months | 2 | 3 |
Where they differ
Avignon is the better base for days out: 36% of the land around it is protected against 8% around Genoa, and 4 theme parks lie within reach where Genoa has none. Summers are hotter and the year sunnier.
Genoa has the coast: 37 beaches nearby against Avignon's single one, and sea warm enough to swim in for four months. It also has many times more bars and clubs, and about three times as many notable places within walking distance of the centre.
Where they are alike
Heritage counts for much the same in both, reached by different routes: Genoa holds far more museums within the city, while Avignon's weight lies in the UNESCO-listed places within day-trip reach.
Winters are mild in each, with January highs of 11-12°C, and both eat well without either dominating: Genoa has about twice as many restaurants near the centre, Avignon a somewhat wider range of kitchens. The national price estimates behind the two countries also sit close together, so cost is unlikely to decide this.
Which traveller are you?
If swimming is the point of the trip, Genoa is the only real answer: 37 beaches nearby, sea reaching 25°C at its warmest, and a coast you can use for a good part of the year.
If you have a car and want the surroundings, choose Avignon: 36% of the land around it is protected, 6 UNESCO-listed places lie within day-trip reach, and 4 theme parks fall within range for children.
If you want a city to walk and drink your way through, Genoa concentrates far more notable places within walking distance of the centre, more museums, and many times more bars and clubs than Avignon.
What the numbers don't tell you
The daily budget figures, €160 and €155, are national estimates of restaurant and hotel price levels in the two countries, not measurements of Avignon or Genoa. A city can sit well above or below its own country's average, by more than the gap between these two numbers, so treat them as background rather than a reason to pick one.
Genoa's coastal strength and its strongest months are the same months, which also means the beaches are at their busiest then. Avignon's heat cuts both ways: its hottest days, at 31°C, arrive in high summer, which is less comfortable than late spring.
When should you go?
The figures behind each month. Each row is shaded against that destination's own year, so the deepest cell is its best month for that measure and the palest its weakest. Shades are not comparable between the two rows.
Temperature and rainfall are thirty-year climate normals, averaged over the years shown. Avignon: 1991-2020 normals, Nimes / Courbessac (34 km from centre). Genoa: 1991-2020 normals, Genova / Sestri (6.7 km from centre).
Avignon is at its best in May and June, with highs of 24-28°C and rain near 50mm. High summer is hotter, better suited to shade than to walking. From September the rain sets in, 111mm in that month alone, and stays through the autumn.
Genoa peaks later, in July and August: 27-28°C, the sea at its warmest, and only 12-20mm of rain, the driest weeks either city sees. Its autumn is wetter than Avignon's, and November is the month to avoid.
Getting there
| Flying from | Avignon | Genoa |
|---|---|---|
| ParisCDG, ORY, BVA | 1 h 25 m €110-119 MRS · 65 km | 1 h 30 m no fares GOA · 7 km |
| MadridMAD | 1 h 35 m no fares MRS · 65 km | 2 h 0 m €63-91 MXP · 137 km |
| IstanbulIST, SAW | 2 h 55 m €219-245 1 stop MRS · 65 km | 2 h 40 m €140-309 MXP · 137 km |
| LisbonLIS | 2 h 10 m €136-184 1 stop MRS · 65 km | 2 h 35 m €78-142 MXP · 137 km |
| FrankfurtFRA, HHN | 1 h 35 m no fares MRS · 65 km | 1 h 15 m €67-76 LIN · 119 km |
| AthensATH | 2 h 40 m €160-212 1 stop MRS · 65 km | 2 h 25 m €91-99 MXP · 137 km |
| NantesNTE | 1 h 30 m €72-162 MRS · 65 km | 1 h 35 m no fares MXP · 137 km |
| AlgiersALG | 1 h 35 m €100-103 MRS · 65 km | 1 h 55 m no fares MXP · 137 km |
| MontrealYUL, YHU, YMX | 7 h 45 m no fares MRS · 65 km | 7 h 50 m no fares MXP · 137 km |
| SeoulICN, GMP | 11 h 35 m no fares MRS · 65 km | 11 h 5 m no fares MXP · 137 km |
The busiest departure cities for these two, with a place kept for each other part of the world. Busiest means arriving passengers where an official count exists, and where none does, the number of non-stop services flown: official route statistics are published by the European reporting countries and by nobody else, so a table ranked on them alone would offer a reader in New York or Tokyo ten European cities. Flying times are estimated from the distance between airports, and every row is a city flown non-stop to both. Where the typical offer connects anyway, the stops are shown. Under each figure is the airport the flight lands at and how far that is from the centre, because the nearest airport is not always the one a route is flown to. Where both columns name the same airport it is one flight, and the difference between the two is the distance printed beside it. Typical return fares for 2026-08 to 2026-10, cached market data up to 7 days old. The figure is the middle half of the offers found, so a single price means they agreed and a range means they did not; for a typical route that middle half spans about a quarter of the median, and for the least settled routes rather more than the median itself.
Before you go
| Measure | Avignon | Genoa |
|---|---|---|
| Official language | French | Italian |
| Currency | Euro (EUR) | Euro (EUR) |
| Sockets | CE230 V, 50 Hz | CFL230 V, 50 Hz |
| Driving side | Right | Right |
| Time zone | UTC+1, UTC+2 in summer | UTC+1, UTC+2 in summer |
| Emergency number | 112 | 112 |
| Elevation | 10 m | 20 m |
| Main airport | Marseille Provence Airport (MRS)65 km from centre125 non-stop destinations | Genoa Cristoforo Colombo Airport (GOA)7 km from centre23 non-stop destinations |
| Public holidays this year | 11 days | 13 days |
By the numbers
| Measure | Avignon | Genoa |
|---|---|---|
| City population | 92,188 | 558,745 |
| People per km² | 1,420 | 2,325 |
| Museums within 10 km | 11 | 51 |
| UNESCO World Heritage sites within 50 km | 6 | 1 |
| Distinct cuisines in the centre | 36 | 41 |
| 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 Avignon or Genoa somewhere new.