VacationSelector
The Sagrada Família, Barcelona
BarcelonaThe Sagrada Família
The cathedral facade, Siena
SienaThe cathedral facade

Photos: Barcelona by Canaan, CC BY-SA 4.0, cropped; Siena by Raimond Spekking, CC BY-SA 4.0, cropped.

Barcelona or Siena?

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 Barcelona for

  • beaches
  • nightlife
  • shopping

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

Choose Siena for

  • wellness
  • day trips

What lies behind each score is written up on Siena’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. Barcelona 75, Siena 14: Barcelona leads by 61 points.
Food & drink. Barcelona 82, Siena 62: Barcelona leads by 20 points.
Culture & sights. Barcelona 86, Siena 78: Barcelona leads by 8 points.
Nightlife. Barcelona 82, Siena 27: Barcelona leads by 55 points.
Nature & outdoors. Barcelona 72, Siena 65: Barcelona leads by 7 points.
Day trips. Barcelona 80, Siena 94: Siena leads by 14 points.
Good for families. Barcelona 76, Siena 38: Barcelona leads by 38 points.
Getting around. Barcelona 80, Siena 60: Barcelona leads by 20 points.
Shopping & style. Barcelona 75, Siena 35: Barcelona leads by 40 points.
Affordability. Barcelona 44, Siena 42: Barcelona leads by 2 points.
Live music & performing arts. Barcelona 70, Siena 36: Barcelona leads by 34 points.
Wellness & relaxation. Barcelona 38, Siena 55: Siena leads by 17 points.
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What lies behind each score is written up on the two cities’ own pages: Barcelona and Siena.

Your match

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

Barcelona
Best match
72match

Wins on beaches and nightlife with your weighting.

Siena
51match

Wins on wellness and day trips with your weighting.

What matters to you?

When should you go?

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

Barcelona in July

28 °Cdaytime high
21 °Cnight-time low
27 mmrain in the month
10 hsunshine a day
24 °Csea
15 hdaylight a day

Siena in July

31 °Cdaytime high
17 °Cnight-time low
27 mmrain in the month
No recordsunshine a day
No seasea
15 hdaylight a day

Daytime high, °C

0°10°20°30°40°JFMAMJJASOND

Rainfall in the month, mm

050100150JFMAMJJASOND
BarcelonaSiena

Where the figures come from

Siena's temperatures are measured 45 km from the centre, at Arezzo.

Siena 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. Barcelona: 1991-2020 normals, Barcelona / Aeropuerto (14.4 km from centre). Siena: 2006-2017 (rainfall 1991-2020) normals, Arezzo (45 km from centre).

Before you go

MeasureBarcelonaSiena
Official languageSpanishItalian
CurrencyEuro (EUR)Euro (EUR)
SocketsCF230 V, 50 HzCFL230 V, 50 Hz
Driving sideRightRight
Time zoneUTC+1, UTC+2 in summerUTC+1, UTC+2 in summer
Emergency number112112
Elevation9 m322 m
Main airportJosep Tarradellas Barcelona-El Prat Airport (BCN)13 km from centre235 non-stop destinationsFlorence Airport, Peretola (FLR)55 km from centre46 non-stop destinations
Public holidays this year14 days13 days

By the numbers

MeasureBarcelonaSiena
City population1,731,64952,812
People per km²17,094446
Museums within 10 km9530
UNESCO World Heritage sites within 50 km35
Swim season, months above 21 °C3 months-

Where else could you go?

Every comparison below shares a destination with this one, so you can follow Barcelona or Siena 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). Tourism statistics from Eurostat, © European Union, reused under CC BY 4.0. Public holidays from Nager.Date (MIT). 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. 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 2026-10-31. Daily budgets are estimates from country price levels.