VacationSelector
Wat Pho, Bangkok
BangkokWat Pho
The Scott Monument and Princes Street Gardens, Edinburgh
EdinburghThe Scott Monument and Princes Street Gardens

Photos: Bangkok by Lu Zhao, Pexels License; Edinburgh by Carlos Delgado, CC BY-SA 3.0, cropped.

Bangkok or Edinburgh?

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 Bangkok for

  • prices
  • food and drink
  • wellness

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

Choose Edinburgh for

  • nature and the outdoors
  • getting around
  • live music and the arts

What lies behind each score is written up on Edinburgh’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. Bangkok 12, Edinburgh 22: Edinburgh leads by 10 points.
Food & drink. Bangkok 95, Edinburgh 53: Bangkok leads by 42 points.
Culture & sights. Bangkok 80, Edinburgh 75: Bangkok leads by 5 points.
Nightlife. Bangkok 85, Edinburgh 50: Bangkok leads by 35 points.
Nature & outdoors. Bangkok 25, Edinburgh 75: Edinburgh leads by 50 points.
Day trips. Bangkok 72, Edinburgh 75: Edinburgh leads by 3 points.
Good for families. Bangkok 50, Edinburgh 62: Edinburgh leads by 12 points.
Getting around. Bangkok 50, Edinburgh 74: Edinburgh leads by 24 points.
Shopping & style. Bangkok 80, Edinburgh 50: Bangkok leads by 30 points.
Affordability. Bangkok 85, Edinburgh 30: Bangkok leads by 55 points.
Live music & performing arts. Bangkok 52, Edinburgh 72: Edinburgh leads by 20 points.
Wellness & relaxation. Bangkok 75, Edinburgh 34: Bangkok leads by 41 points.
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What lies behind each score is written up on the two cities’ own pages: Bangkok and Edinburgh.

Your match

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

Bangkok
Best match
63match

Wins on prices and food and drink with your weighting.

Edinburgh
56match

Wins on nature and the outdoors and getting around with your weighting.

What matters to you?

When should you go?

Pick your month. The climate figures are measured averages, not a forecast.

Bangkok in July

34 °Cdaytime high
26 °Cnight-time low
184 mmrain in the month
5 hsunshine a day
30 °Csea
13 hdaylight a day

Edinburgh in July

19 °Cdaytime high
11 °Cnight-time low
66 mmrain in the month
5 hsunshine a day
14 °Csea
17 hdaylight a day

Daytime high, °C

0°10°20°30°40°JFMAMJJASOND

Rainfall in the month, mm

0100200300400JFMAMJJASOND
BangkokEdinburgh

Where the figures come from

Edinburgh 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.

Edinburgh's sunshine is measured 52 km from the centre, at Leuchars.

Temperature and rainfall are climate normals, averaged over the years shown. Bangkok: 1991-2020 normals, Bangkok (5.7 km from centre). Edinburgh: 1991-2020 normals, Edinburgh Airport (10 km from centre).

Before you go

MeasureBangkokEdinburgh
Official languageThaiEnglish
CurrencyBaht (THB)Pound Sterling (GBP)
SocketsABCF220 V, 50 HzG230 V, 50 Hz
Driving sideLeftLeft
Time zoneUTC+7UTC, UTC+1 in summer
Emergency numberPolice 191, ambulance 1669, fire 199112 or 999
Elevation2 m47 m
Main airportSuvarnabhumi Airport (BKK)26 km from centre150 non-stop destinationsEdinburgh Airport (EDI)11 km from centre163 non-stop destinations
Public holidays this year-10 days

By the numbers

MeasureBangkokEdinburgh
City population5,676,648488,050
People per km²3,6191,884
Museums within 10 km5932
UNESCO World Heritage sites within 50 km03
Swim season, months above 21 °C12 monthsNone

Where else could you go?

Every comparison below shares a destination with this one, so you can follow Bangkok or Edinburgh 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). 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. Public holidays from Nager.Date (MIT). 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.