VacationSelector
Pulteney Bridge and the weir on the Avon, Bath
BathPulteney Bridge and the weir on the Avon
The wharf at Queenstown with the Remarkables behind, Queenstown
QueenstownThe wharf at Queenstown with the Remarkables behind

Photos: Bath by Lucas Carlini, Pexels License; Queenstown by Robert Linsdell, CC BY 2.0, cropped.

Bath or Queenstown?

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 Bath for

  • culture and sights
  • wellness
  • day trips

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

Choose Queenstown for

  • nature and the outdoors
  • nightlife
  • beaches

What lies behind each score is written up on Queenstown’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. Bath 10, Queenstown 20: Queenstown leads by 10 points.
Food & drink. Bath 44, Queenstown 45: Queenstown leads by 1 points.
Culture & sights. Bath 68, Queenstown 12: Bath leads by 56 points.
Nightlife. Bath 30, Queenstown 42: Queenstown leads by 12 points.
Nature & outdoors. Bath 58, Queenstown 97: Queenstown leads by 39 points.
Day trips. Bath 80, Queenstown 50: Bath leads by 30 points.
Good for families. Bath 50, Queenstown 60: Queenstown leads by 10 points.
Getting around. Bath 72, Queenstown 45: Bath leads by 27 points.
Shopping & style. Bath 54, Queenstown 28: Bath leads by 26 points.
Affordability. Bath 27, Queenstown 20: Bath leads by 7 points.
Live music & performing arts. Bath 44, Queenstown 14: Bath leads by 30 points.
Wellness & relaxation. Bath 78, Queenstown 42: Bath leads by 36 points.
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What lies behind each score is written up on the two cities’ own pages: Bath and Queenstown.

Your match

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

Bath
Best match
51match

Wins on culture and sights and wellness with your weighting.

Queenstown
40match

Wins on nature and the outdoors and nightlife with your weighting.

What matters to you?

When should you go?

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

Bath in July

21 °Cdaytime high
12 °Cnight-time low
62 mmrain in the month
7 hsunshine a day
18 °Csea
16 hdaylight a day

Queenstown in July

6 °Cdaytime high
-1 °Cnight-time low
115 mmrain in the month
No recordsunshine a day
No seasea
9 hdaylight a day

Daytime high, °C

0°5°10°15°20°25°JFMAMJJASOND

Rainfall in the month, mm

050100150200250JFMAMJJASOND
BathQueenstown

Where the figures come from

Bath's temperatures are measured 29 km from the centre, at Lyneham.

Bath 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.

Queenstown 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. Bath: 1991-2020 normals, Lyneham (29.2 km from centre). Queenstown: 1991-2020 normals, TerraClimate 4 km grid at the town, no weather station within 90 km.

Before you go

MeasureBathQueenstown
Official languageEnglishEnglish, New Zealand Sign Language, Māori
CurrencyPound Sterling (GBP)New Zealand Dollar (NZD)
SocketsG230 V, 50 HzI230 V, 50 Hz
Driving sideLeftLeft
Time zoneUTC, UTC+1 in summerUTC+12, UTC+13 in summer
Emergency number112 or 999111
Elevation132 m324 m
Main airportBristol Airport (BRS)25 km from centre117 non-stop destinationsQueenstown Airport (ZQN)7 km from centre7 non-stop destinations
Public holidays this year8 days12 days

By the numbers

MeasureBathQueenstown
City population94,09229,000
People per km²3,245-
Museums within 10 km170
UNESCO World Heritage sites within 50 km20
Swim season, months above 21 °CNone-

Where else could you go?

Every comparison below shares a destination with this one, so you can follow Bath or Queenstown 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). Public holidays from Nager.Date (MIT). 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. Ground elevations sampled from the Mapzen terrain tiles via OpenTopoData, merging SRTM, ASTER, NED, EU-DEM and national sources. Temperature and rainfall for destinations with no weather station are from the NASA POWER 2001-2020 climatology, derived from MERRA-2. 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.