Bath or Cardiff?
Two destinations compared on nine measures of openly sourced data. Weight what matters to you and the verdict follows.
Your match
Wins on museums & heritage and good for families with your weighting.
Wins on beaches & swimming and places to eat with your weighting.
What matters to you?
Pick a travel style or drag the sliders. The match scores above update as you do.
The verdict
Choose Bath if you want heritage on foot: museums packed tightly around the centre and 2 UNESCO-listed places within day-trip reach, with more protected countryside around it.
Choose Cardiff if you want the sea within reach, 2km from the centre with 8 beaches nearby, plus roughly twice the restaurants and a much stronger night out.
Scoreboard
Each measure scored 0 to 100. Open a row for the figures behind the score.
Beaches & swimming. Cardiff leads by 38 points.38
| Bath | Cardiff | |
|---|---|---|
| Score | 8 | 46 |
| Swim season months | 0 | 0 |
| Beaches 10 km | 1 | 8 |
| Coast distance | 29 km | 2 km |
| Water distance | 29 km | 2 km |
Places to eat. Cardiff leads by 14 points.14
| Bath | Cardiff | |
|---|---|---|
| Score | 46 | 60 |
| Restaurants within 2 km of centre | 245 | 541 |
| Effective number of cuisines within 2 km | 26 | 32 |
Museums & heritage. Bath leads by 8 points.8
| Bath | Cardiff | |
|---|---|---|
| Score | 47 | 39 |
| Museums within 10 km | 20 | 61 |
| Museums within 2 km of centre | 14 | 6 |
| Share of museums within 2 km % | 70 | 10 |
| Unesco sites within 50 km | 2 | 1 |
Nightlife. Cardiff leads by 12 points.12
| Bath | Cardiff | |
|---|---|---|
| Score | 36 | 48 |
| Drinking venues within 4 km | 320 | 536 |
| Drinking venues within 2 km of centre | 240 | 395 |
| Share of drinking venues within 2 km % | 75 | 74 |
| Nightclubs within 4 km | 11 | 35 |
Nature & day trips. Cardiff leads by 6 points.6
| Bath | Cardiff | |
|---|---|---|
| Score | 44 | 50 |
| Protected land share 50 km % | 28 | 18 |
| Landscape blanket share 50 km % | 27 | 15 |
| Land share of disc % | 92 | 68 |
| Park area within 2 km | 45 hectares | 88 hectares |
Good for families. Bath leads by 8 points.8
| Bath | Cardiff | |
|---|---|---|
| Score | 40 | 32 |
| Tourist attractions within 2 km | 14 | 4 |
| Park area within 2 km | 45 hectares | 88 hectares |
| Theme parks within 30 km | 1 | 2 |
Sights concentration. Cardiff leads by 13 points.13
| Bath | Cardiff | |
|---|---|---|
| Score | 32 | 45 |
| Notable places within 2 km | 25 | 51 |
| Min wikipedia languages | 5 | 5 |
Value for money. Bath and Cardiff are level on 54.
| Bath | Cardiff | |
|---|---|---|
| Score | 54 | 54 |
| Price level global | 84.9 | 84.9 |
| Daily budget | — | — |
Year-round weather. Bath leads by 1 points.1
| Bath | Cardiff | |
|---|---|---|
| Score | 55 | 54 |
| Monthly daytime high | 6.8 °C to 21.4 °C | 7.7 °C to 20.2 °C |
| Monthly rainfall | 49 mm to 87 mm | 49 mm to 87 mm |
| Dry months | 0 | 0 |
Where they differ
Bath is the better base for heritage on foot: its museums sit tightly around the centre, and it has 2 UNESCO-listed places within day-trip reach against Cardiff's 1. It also has about three times as many tourist attractions near the centre.
Cardiff has about twice as many restaurants near the centre and a wider range of kitchens, roughly three times the nightclubs, and about twice as many notable places within walking distance. The sea is 2km away with 8 beaches nearby, against 29km from Bath.
Where they are alike
The weather is close to identical. Bath runs a shade warmer, with highs of 7-21°C across the year against Cardiff's 8-20°C, and rainfall matches month for month, with no month at 40mm or less in either.
They also sit close on countryside and museums. Both have protected land within day-trip reach, both have museums and UNESCO-listed places reachable in a day, and the sea, at 18°C in its warmest month, is cool in both.
Which traveller are you?
The heritage walker should take Bath. Its museums sit tightly around the centre, it has 2 UNESCO-listed places within day-trip reach, and it carries about three times as many tourist attractions near the middle of town.
Anyone travelling to eat and go out should take Cardiff: about twice as many restaurants near the centre, a wider spread of kitchens, roughly three times the nightclubs, and more notable places within walking distance.
Families are split. Cardiff has the sea 2km away, 8 beaches nearby, 2 theme parks within reach against Bath's 1, and more park space; Bath answers with attractions near the centre and 28% protected land around it.
What the numbers don't tell you
No cost comparison is possible here. The value figure both cities carry is a national price level, identical by construction because they sit in the same country, and the dataset holds no daily budget for either. It tells you nothing about which trip costs more, so check prices for your own dates.
Cardiff's beach advantage is about access, not conditions. The sea sits 2km from the centre with 8 beaches nearby, but it peaks at 18°C and no month reaches 21°C, so swimming is a short, cool season. Rainfall is the same in both, so autumn is wet either way.
When should you go?
The figures behind each month. Each row is shaded against that destination's own year, so the deepest cell is its best month for that measure and the palest its weakest. Shades are not comparable between the two rows.
Temperature and rainfall are thirty-year climate normals, averaged over the years shown. Bath: 1991-2020 normals, Lyneham (29.2 km from centre). Cardiff: 1991-2020 normals, Cardiff-Wales Airport (14.9 km from centre).
Bath is the warmer choice in summer, with highs of 21°C in July and August and the driest stretch of the year, 49-66mm a month from March to September.
Cardiff peaks at 20°C and puts the sea, 18°C at its August best, 2km from the centre, so its summer edge is swimming rather than warmth. Its winters are marginally milder, 8-9°C against Bath's 7°C, but October to January is the wettest run in both, 77-87mm a month.
Getting there
| Flying from | Bath | Cardiff |
|---|---|---|
| Puerto del RosarioFUE | 3 h 50 m no fares BRS · 25 km | 3 h 50 m no fares BRS · 34 km |
| PalmaPMI | 2 h 20 m no fares BRS · 25 km | 2 h 20 m no fares BRS · 34 km |
| AntalyaAYT | 4 h 20 m no fares BRS · 25 km | 4 h 20 m no fares BRS · 34 km |
| Las PalmasLPA | 4 h 0 m no fares BRS · 25 km | 4 h 0 m no fares BRS · 34 km |
| ArrecifeACE | 3 h 45 m no fares BRS · 25 km | 3 h 45 m no fares BRS · 34 km |
| IbizaIBZ | 2 h 20 m no fares BRS · 25 km | 2 h 20 m no fares BRS · 34 km |
| MarrakechRAK | 3 h 20 m no fares BRS · 25 km | 3 h 20 m no fares BRS · 34 km |
| New DelhiDEL | 8 h 40 m no fares BHX · 126 km | 8 h 40 m no fares BHX · 146 km |
| BridgetownBGI | 8 h 25 m no fares CWL · 68 km | 8 h 25 m no fares CWL · 15 km |
| TorontoYYZ, YHM, YTZ | 7 h 10 m no fares CWL · 68 km | 7 h 10 m no fares CWL · 15 km |
The busiest departure cities for these two, with a place kept for each other part of the world. Busiest means arriving passengers where an official count exists, and where none does, the number of non-stop services flown: official route statistics are published by the European reporting countries and by nobody else, so a table ranked on them alone would offer a reader in New York or Tokyo ten European cities. Flying times are estimated from the distance between airports, and every row is a city flown non-stop to both. Where the typical offer connects anyway, the stops are shown. Under each figure is the airport the flight lands at and how far that is from the centre, because the nearest airport is not always the one a route is flown to. Where both columns name the same airport it is one flight, and the difference between the two is the distance printed beside it.
Before you go
| Measure | Bath | Cardiff |
|---|---|---|
| Official language | English | English |
| Currency | Pound Sterling (GBP) | Pound Sterling (GBP) |
| Sockets | G230 V, 50 Hz | G230 V, 50 Hz |
| Driving side | Left | Left |
| Time zone | UTC, UTC+1 in summer | UTC, UTC+1 in summer |
| Emergency number | 112 or 999 | 112 or 999 |
| Elevation | 132 m | 41 m |
| Main airport | Bristol Airport (BRS)25 km from centre116 non-stop destinations | Cardiff International Airport (CWL)15 km from centre8 non-stop destinations |
| Public holidays this year | 8 days | 8 days |
By the numbers
| Measure | Bath | Cardiff |
|---|---|---|
| City population | 94,092 | 383,536 |
| People per km² | 3,245 | 2,734 |
| Museums within 10 km | 17 | 9 |
| UNESCO World Heritage sites within 50 km | 2 | 1 |
| Distinct cuisines in the centre | 38 | 55 |
| Swim season, months above 21 °C | None | None |
Where else could you go?
Every comparison below shares a destination with this one, so you can follow Bath or Cardiff somewhere new.