VacationSelector
The Flame Towers from the seafront, Baku
BakuThe Flame Towers from the seafront
Playa Tamarindo, Tamarindo
TamarindoPlaya Tamarindo

Photos: Baku by Zulfugar Karimov, Pexels License; Tamarindo by Jarle Naustvik, CC BY 2.0, cropped.

Baku or Tamarindo?

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
  • shopping

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

Choose Tamarindo for

  • nature and the outdoors
  • beaches
  • wellness

What lies behind each score is written up on Tamarindo’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, Tamarindo 85: Tamarindo leads by 45 points.
Food & drink. Baku 60, Tamarindo 38: Baku leads by 22 points.
Culture & sights. Baku 62, Tamarindo 5: Baku leads by 57 points.
Nightlife. Baku 42, Tamarindo 45: Tamarindo leads by 3 points.
Nature & outdoors. Baku 30, Tamarindo 76: Tamarindo leads by 46 points.
Day trips. Baku 45, Tamarindo 28: Baku leads by 17 points.
Good for families. Baku 45, Tamarindo 55: Tamarindo leads by 10 points.
Getting around. Baku 58, Tamarindo 32: Baku leads by 26 points.
Shopping & style. Baku 48, Tamarindo 18: Baku leads by 30 points.
Affordability. Baku 64, Tamarindo 36: Baku leads by 28 points.
Live music & performing arts. Baku 52, Tamarindo 10: Baku leads by 42 points.
Wellness & relaxation. Baku 30, Tamarindo 45: Tamarindo leads by 15 points.
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What lies behind each score is written up on the two cities’ own pages: Baku and Tamarindo.

Your match

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

Baku
Best match
48match

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

Tamarindo
39match

Wins on nature and the outdoors and beaches 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

Tamarindo in July

33 °Cdaytime high
23 °Cnight-time low
129 mmrain in the month
29 °Csea
13 hdaylight a day

Daytime high, °C

0°10°20°30°40°JFMAMJJASOND

Rainfall in the month, mm

0100200300400JFMAMJJASOND
BakuTamarindo

Where the figures come from

Tamarindo's temperatures are measured 54 km from the centre, at Liberia.

Tamarindo 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. Baku: 1991-2020 normals, Mashtaga (23.2 km from centre). Tamarindo: 1991-2020 normals, Liberia (53.8 km from centre).

Before you go

MeasureBakuTamarindo
Official languageAzerbaijani, Azerbaijani Sign LanguageSpanish
CurrencyAzerbaijan Manat (AZN)Costa Rican Colon (CRC)
SocketsCF220 V, 50 HzAB120 V, 60 Hz
Driving sideRightRight
Time zoneUTC+4UTC-6
Emergency number102 or 112911
Elevation-28 m27 m
Main airportHeydar Aliyev International Airport (GYD)22 km from centre79 non-stop destinationsDaniel Oduber Quirós International Airport (LIR)43 km from centre30 non-stop destinations
Public holidays this year-11 days

By the numbers

MeasureBakuTamarindo
City population2,300,5007,132
People per km²1,07557
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 Tamarindo 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. Public holidays from Nager.Date (MIT). Daylight hours computed from each destination's latitude using the NOAA solar position algorithm. Exchange rates via Frankfurter, based on European Central Bank reference rates.

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.