VacationSelector
Wat Pho, Bangkok
BangkokWat Pho
The main beach with the green hills behind, Sayulita
SayulitaThe main beach with the green hills behind

Photos: Bangkok by Lu Zhao, Pexels License; Sayulita by Luisalvaz, CC BY-SA 4.0, cropped.

Bangkok or Sayulita?

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

  • culture and sights
  • food and drink
  • nightlife

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

Choose Sayulita for

  • beaches
  • nature and the outdoors

What lies behind each score is written up on Sayulita’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, Sayulita 80: Sayulita leads by 68 points.
Food & drink. Bangkok 95, Sayulita 42: Bangkok leads by 53 points.
Culture & sights. Bangkok 80, Sayulita 7: Bangkok leads by 73 points.
Nightlife. Bangkok 85, Sayulita 33: Bangkok leads by 52 points.
Nature & outdoors. Bangkok 25, Sayulita 72: Sayulita leads by 47 points.
Day trips. Bangkok 72, Sayulita 42: Bangkok leads by 30 points.
Good for families. Bangkok 50, Sayulita 42: Bangkok leads by 8 points.
Getting around. Bangkok 50, Sayulita 48: Bangkok leads by 2 points.
Shopping & style. Bangkok 80, Sayulita 33: Bangkok leads by 47 points.
Affordability. Bangkok 85, Sayulita 45: Bangkok leads by 40 points.
Live music & performing arts. Bangkok 52, Sayulita 12: Bangkok leads by 40 points.
Wellness & relaxation. Bangkok 75, Sayulita 58: Bangkok leads by 17 points.
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What lies behind each score is written up on the two cities’ own pages: Bangkok and Sayulita.

Your match

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

Bangkok
Best match
63match

Wins on culture and sights and food and drink with your weighting.

Sayulita
43match

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

Sayulita in July

29 °Cdaytime high
27 °Cnight-time low
342 mmrain in the month
No recordsunshine a day
30 °Csea
13 hdaylight a day

Daytime high, °C

0°10°20°30°40°JFMAMJJASOND

Rainfall in the month, mm

0100200300400JFMAMJJASOND
BangkokSayulita

Where the figures come from

Sayulita 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. Bangkok: 1991-2020 normals, Bangkok (5.7 km from centre). Sayulita: 2001-2020 normals, NASA POWER reanalysis grid, no weather station within 90 km.

Before you go

MeasureBangkokSayulita
Official languageThaiSpanish, Nahuatl, Yucatec Maya
CurrencyBaht (THB)Mexican Peso (MXN)
SocketsABCF220 V, 50 HzAB127 V, 60 Hz
Driving sideLeftRight
Time zoneUTC+7UTC-6
Emergency numberPolice 191, ambulance 1669, fire 199911
Elevation2 m2 m
Main airportSuvarnabhumi Airport (BKK)26 km from centre150 non-stop destinationsPuerto Vallarta International Airport (PVR)29 km from centre52 non-stop destinations
Public holidays this year-9 days

By the numbers

MeasureBangkokSayulita
City population5,676,6483,390
People per km²3,619-
Museums within 10 km590
UNESCO World Heritage sites within 50 km01
Swim season, months above 21 °C12 months12 months

Where else could you go?

Every comparison below shares a destination with this one, so you can follow Bangkok or Sayulita 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. 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). 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 2026-11-02. Daily budgets are estimates from country price levels.