VacationSelector
Wat Pho, Bangkok
BangkokWat Pho
Palermo Cathedral, Palermo
PalermoPalermo Cathedral

Photos: Bangkok by Lu Zhao, Pexels License; Palermo by Antonino Giangrasso, Pexels License.

Bangkok or Palermo?

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

  • wellness
  • shopping
  • nightlife

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

Choose Palermo for

  • beaches
  • nature and the outdoors
  • day trips

What lies behind each score is written up on Palermo’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, Palermo 77: Palermo leads by 65 points.
Food & drink. Bangkok 95, Palermo 81: Bangkok leads by 14 points.
Culture & sights. Bangkok and Palermo are level on 80.
Nightlife. Bangkok 85, Palermo 58: Bangkok leads by 27 points.
Nature & outdoors. Bangkok 25, Palermo 72: Palermo leads by 47 points.
Day trips. Bangkok 72, Palermo 84: Palermo leads by 12 points.
Good for families. Bangkok 50, Palermo 44: Bangkok leads by 6 points.
Getting around. Bangkok and Palermo are level on 50.
Shopping & style. Bangkok 80, Palermo 44: Bangkok leads by 36 points.
Affordability. Bangkok 85, Palermo 63: Bangkok leads by 22 points.
Live music & performing arts. Bangkok 52, Palermo 62: Palermo leads by 10 points.
Wellness & relaxation. Bangkok 75, Palermo 30: Bangkok leads by 45 points.
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What lies behind each score is written up on the two cities’ own pages: Bangkok and Palermo.

Your match

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

Too close to call, 1 point apart

Bangkok
63match

Wins on wellness and shopping with your weighting.

Palermo
62match

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.

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

Palermo in July

29 °Cdaytime high
23 °Cnight-time low
2 mmrain in the month
11 hsunshine a day
26 °Csea
15 hdaylight a day

Daytime high, °C

0°10°20°30°40°JFMAMJJASOND

Rainfall in the month, mm

0100200300400JFMAMJJASOND
BangkokPalermo

Where the figures come from

Palermo 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.

Palermo's sunshine is measured 67 km from the centre, at Ustica.

Temperature and rainfall are climate normals, averaged over the years shown. Bangkok: 1991-2020 normals, Bangkok (5.7 km from centre). Palermo: 1991-2020 (sunshine 1961-1990) normals, Palermo / Punta Raisi (24.1 km from centre).

Before you go

MeasureBangkokPalermo
Official languageThaiItalian
CurrencyBaht (THB)Euro (EUR)
SocketsABCF220 V, 50 HzCFL230 V, 50 Hz
Driving sideLeftRight
Time zoneUTC+7UTC+1, UTC+2 in summer
Emergency numberPolice 191, ambulance 1669, fire 199112
Elevation2 m14 m
Main airportSuvarnabhumi Airport (BKK)26 km from centre150 non-stop destinationsFalcone–Borsellino Airport (PMO)25 km from centre106 non-stop destinations
Public holidays this year-13 days

By the numbers

MeasureBangkokPalermo
City population5,676,648630,167
People per km²3,6193,924
Museums within 10 km5942
UNESCO World Heritage sites within 50 km01
Swim season, months above 21 °C12 months5 months

Where else could you go?

Every comparison below shares a destination with this one, so you can follow Bangkok or Palermo 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. Tourism statistics from Eurostat, © European Union, reused under CC BY 4.0. 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.