VacationSelector
The Flame Towers from the seafront, Baku
BakuThe Flame Towers from the seafront
The town beach and the Portal Maya sculpture, Playa del Carmen
Playa del CarmenThe town beach and the Portal Maya sculpture

Photos: Baku by Zulfugar Karimov, Pexels License; Playa del Carmen by lazyweaver, CC BY 3.0, cropped.

Baku or Playa del Carmen?

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 Baku for

  • culture and sights
  • live music and the arts
  • prices

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

Choose Playa del Carmen for

  • beaches
  • nature and the outdoors
  • families

What lies behind each score is written up on Playa del Carmen’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. Baku 40, Playa del Carmen 88: Playa del Carmen leads by 48 points.
Food & drink. Baku 60, Playa del Carmen 52: Baku leads by 8 points.
Culture & sights. Baku 62, Playa del Carmen 12: Baku leads by 50 points.
Nightlife. Baku 42, Playa del Carmen 66: Playa del Carmen leads by 24 points.
Nature & outdoors. Baku 30, Playa del Carmen 74: Playa del Carmen leads by 44 points.
Day trips. Baku 45, Playa del Carmen 72: Playa del Carmen leads by 27 points.
Good for families. Baku 45, Playa del Carmen 78: Playa del Carmen leads by 33 points.
Getting around. Baku 58, Playa del Carmen 55: Baku leads by 3 points.
Shopping & style. Baku 48, Playa del Carmen 38: Baku leads by 10 points.
Affordability. Baku 64, Playa del Carmen 52: Baku leads by 12 points.
Live music & performing arts. Baku 52, Playa del Carmen 22: Baku leads by 30 points.
Wellness & relaxation. Baku 30, Playa del Carmen 54: Playa del Carmen leads by 24 points.
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What lies behind each score is written up on the two cities’ own pages: Baku and Playa del Carmen.

Your match

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

Baku
48match

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

Playa del Carmen
Best match
55match

Wins on beaches and 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.

Baku in July

30 °Cdaytime high
23 °Cnight-time low
5 mmrain in the month
25 °Csea
15 hdaylight a day

Playa del Carmen in July

29 °Cdaytime high
27 °Cnight-time low
96 mmrain in the month
29 °Csea
13 hdaylight a day

Daytime high, °C

0°10°20°30°40°JFMAMJJASOND

Rainfall in the month, mm

050100150200250JFMAMJJASOND
BakuPlaya del Carmen

Where the figures come from

Playa del Carmen has no weather station within reach, so its figures come from a gridded climate model rather than a measured record, and read a broad area rather than the city itself.

Temperature and rainfall are climate normals, averaged over the years shown. Baku: 1991-2020 normals, Mashtaga (23.2 km from centre). Playa del Carmen: 2001-2020 normals, NASA POWER reanalysis grid, no weather station within 90 km.

Before you go

MeasureBakuPlaya del Carmen
Official languageAzerbaijani, Azerbaijani Sign LanguageSpanish, Nahuatl, Yucatec Maya
CurrencyAzerbaijan Manat (AZN)Mexican Peso (MXN)
SocketsCF220 V, 50 HzAB127 V, 60 Hz
Driving sideRightRight
Time zoneUTC+4UTC-5
Emergency number102 or 112911
Elevation-28 m8 m
Main airportHeydar Aliyev International Airport (GYD)22 km from centre79 non-stop destinationsCancún International Airport (CUN)50 km from centre137 non-stop destinations
Public holidays this year-9 days

By the numbers

MeasureBakuPlaya del Carmen
City population2,300,500304,942
People per km²1,075-
Museums within 10 km500
UNESCO World Heritage sites within 50 km20
Swim season, months above 21 °C4 months12 months

Where else could you go?

Every comparison below shares a destination with this one, so you can follow Baku or Playa del Carmen 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). 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. Temperature and rainfall for destinations with no weather station are from the NASA POWER 2001-2020 climatology, derived from MERRA-2. Public holidays from Nager.Date (MIT). 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.