VacationSelector

Avignon or Montpellier?

Two destinations compared on nine measures of openly sourced data. Weight what matters to you and the verdict follows.

Your match

Avignon
41
match

Wins on museums & heritage and sights concentration with your weighting.

Montpellier
✓ Best match
47
match

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 Avignon if the trip is built around heritage: more museums, packed tightly around the centre, and 6 UNESCO-listed places within day-trip reach against Montpellier's 2, plus hotter high summer days.

Choose Montpellier if you want water and evenings out: 8 beaches nearby where Avignon has barely any, a much wider range of kitchens near the centre, and far more bars and clubs.

Scoreboard

Each measure scored 0 to 100. Open a row for the figures behind the score.

AvignonMontpellier
Beaches & swimming. Montpellier leads by 32 points.32
AvignonMontpellier
Score032
Swim season months02
Beaches 10 km18
Coast distance55 km9 km
Water distance—9 km
Places to eat. Montpellier leads by 21 points.21
AvignonMontpellier
Score4465
Restaurants within 2 km of centre336737
Effective number of cuisines within 2 km1834
Museums & heritage. Avignon leads by 29 points.29
AvignonMontpellier
Score5526
Museums within 10 km1714
Museums within 2 km of centre163
Share of museums within 2 km %9421
Unesco sites within 50 km62
Nightlife. Montpellier leads by 22 points.22
AvignonMontpellier
Score1638
Drinking venues within 4 km115318
Drinking venues within 2 km of centre97265
Share of drinking venues within 2 km %8483
Nightclubs within 4 km425
Nature & day trips. Avignon leads by 1 points.1
AvignonMontpellier
Score4443
Protected land share 50 km %3615
Landscape blanket share 50 km %3110
Land share of disc %10070
Park area within 2 km23 hectares55 hectares
Good for families. Montpellier leads by 2 points.2
AvignonMontpellier
Score4244
Tourist attractions within 2 km158
Park area within 2 km23 hectares55 hectares
Theme parks within 30 km47
Sights concentration. Avignon leads by 2 points.2
AvignonMontpellier
Score4038
Notable places within 2 km4035
Min wikipedia languages55
Value for money. Avignon and Montpellier are level on 62.
AvignonMontpellier
Score6262
Price level global73.773.7
Daily budget€160€160
Year-round weather. Montpellier leads by 4 points.4
AvignonMontpellier
Score7074
Monthly daytime high11.2 °C to 31.2 °C12 °C to 29.6 °C
Monthly rainfall34 mm to 111 mm17 mm to 93 mm
Dry months25
0255075100

Where they differ

Avignon is the stronger choice for heritage: it has somewhat more museums than Montpellier, they sit more tightly around the centre, and it opens onto 6 UNESCO-listed places within day-trip reach against Montpellier's 2.

Montpellier owns the coast and the evenings. It has 8 beaches nearby where Avignon has barely any, and two late-summer months with the sea above 21°C, which Avignon cannot offer at all. It also has roughly three times as many places to drink, and many more nightclubs, mostly central.

Where they are alike

Day trips come out much the same, reached differently: 36% of the land around Avignon is protected against 15% around Montpellier, while Montpellier has about twice as much park space near the centre.

They are close on walking and on families too. Each has a similar number of notable places within walking distance of the centre, and both suit children: attractions in Avignon's centre, parks and a few more theme parks around Montpellier. Year-round highs run 11-31°C and 12-30°C.

Which traveller are you?

For someone travelling for museums and old stone, Avignon: more museums, close together in the centre, and 6 UNESCO-listed places within day-trip reach against 2 from Montpellier.

For eating and going out, Montpellier: far more restaurants near the centre and a much wider range of kitchens, plus many more places to drink and considerably more clubs.

For a family summer, Montpellier again: 8 beaches nearby, sea at 22°C in August, more park space and more theme parks within reach. Avignon answers with attractions clustered in the centre, better if the children walk rather than swim.

What the numbers don't tell you

The value comparison between these two carries no information. It reflects a national price level, identical for both by construction, and the €160 daily budget beside it is one national estimate rather than a measurement of either city. Neither can be called the cheaper trip on this evidence.

Montpellier's coastal advantage is narrower than it looks: the sea passes 21°C only in a short late-summer window, which is also when both cities are at their hottest and most crowded. And the mild autumn temperatures arrive with the year's heaviest rain in both, 88-111mm in September.

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.

J
F
M
A
M
J
J
A
S
O
N
D
Daytime high, °C
Avignon
11
13
17
19
24
28
31
31
26
21
15
12
Montpellier
12
13
16
19
23
27
30
29
25
21
16
13
Sea temperature, °C
Avignon
No coastline within reach
Montpellier
12
12
12
14
16
19
21
22
20
18
16
14
Rainfall, mm
Avignon
65
40
44
64
58
44
34
47
111
90
97
57
Montpellier
56
35
39
56
46
33
17
36
88
93
78
59
Daylight, hours per day
Avignon
9
10
12
13
15
15
15
14
13
11
10
9
Montpellier
9
11
12
13
15
15
15
14
13
11
10
9
Sunshine, hours per day
Avignon
5
6
8
8
10
11
12
11
9
6
5
4
Montpellier
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
10
8
6
5
5

Temperature and rainfall are thirty-year climate normals, averaged over the years shown. Avignon: 1991-2020 normals, Nimes / Courbessac (34 km from centre). Montpellier: 1991-2020 normals, Montpellier (7.8 km from centre).

WorseBetter

Avignon is at its best in late spring, when highs reach 24-28°C and rainfall stays moderate. High summer runs to 31°C, hotter than Montpellier ever gets, and September is its wettest month at 111mm, so early June is the safer bet for long days outdoors.

Montpellier holds up better through high summer: July is dry at 17mm with highs of 30°C, and the sea reaches 21-22°C by August. Both cities turn wet in October, so take the coast before then.

Getting there

Flying fromAvignonMontpellier
ParisCDG, ORY, BVA
1 h 25 m
€110-119
MRS · 65 km
1 h 25 m
no fares
MPL · 8 km
BordeauxBOD
1 h 15 m
no fares
MRS · 65 km
1 h 15 m
no fares
MRS · 109 km
BastiaBIA
1 h 5 m
no fares
MRS · 65 km
1 h 5 m
no fares
MRS · 109 km
AjaccioAJA
1 h 5 m
no fares
MRS · 65 km
1 h 5 m
no fares
MRS · 109 km
TunisTUN
1 h 40 m
no fares
MRS · 65 km
1 h 40 m
no fares
MRS · 109 km
NantesNTE
1 h 30 m
€72-162
MRS · 65 km
1 h 20 m
no fares
MPL · 8 km
MadridMAD
1 h 35 m
no fares
MRS · 65 km
1 h 35 m
no fares
MRS · 109 km
MunichMUC
1 h 35 m
no fares
MRS · 65 km
1 h 35 m
no fares
MRS · 109 km
MontrealYUL, YHU, YMX
7 h 45 m
no fares
MRS · 65 km
7 h 45 m
no fares
MRS · 109 km
SeoulICN, GMP
11 h 35 m
no fares
MRS · 65 km
11 h 35 m
no fares
MRS · 109 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

MeasureAvignonMontpellier
Official languageFrenchFrench
CurrencyEuro (EUR)Euro (EUR)
SocketsCE230 V, 50 HzCE230 V, 50 Hz
Driving sideRightRight
Time zoneUTC+1, UTC+2 in summerUTC+1, UTC+2 in summer
Emergency number112112
Elevation10 m7 m
Main airportMarseille Provence Airport (MRS)65 km from centre125 non-stop destinationsMontpellier-Méditerranée Airport (MPL)8 km from centre36 non-stop destinations
Public holidays this year11 days11 days

By the numbers

MeasureAvignonMontpellier
City population92,188310,240
People per km²1,4205,452
Museums within 10 km1114
UNESCO World Heritage sites within 50 km62
Distinct cuisines in the centre3665
Swim season, months above 21 °C–2 months

Where else could you go?

Every comparison below shares a destination with this one, so you can follow Avignon or Montpellier somewhere new.

Browse every destination we have measured

Sources

© OpenStreetMap contributors, data available under the Open Database Licence. Place counts include data from Overture Maps Foundation (CDLA Permissive 2.0), assembled from Meta, Microsoft, Foursquare and other providers. Notable-place counts from Wikidata (CC0), weighted by Wikipedia language editions. Structured data from Wikidata (CC0). Weather data by Meteostat. Meteorological data provided by NOAA, DWD and others. 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. 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. Typical fares from Travelpayouts (Aviasales data). Route-level air passenger statistics from Eurostat, © European Union, reused under CC BY 4.0. Exchange rates via Frankfurter, based on European Central Bank reference rates.

Scores follow rubric v2; snapshot generated 2026-08-31. Typical prices can be up to 7 days old. Daily budgets are estimates from country price levels.