VacationSelector
The beach with its parasols and the boardwalk, Bethany Beach
Bethany BeachThe beach with its parasols and the boardwalk
The Anshun Bridge over the Jin River, Chengdu
ChengduThe Anshun Bridge over the Jin River

Photos: Bethany Beach by Doug Olson, CC BY-SA 3.0, cropped; Chengdu by TurnOnTheNight, CC BY-SA 4.0, cropped.

Bethany Beach or Chengdu?

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 Bethany Beach for

  • beaches
  • families

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

Choose Chengdu for

  • nightlife
  • food and drink
  • culture and sights

What lies behind each score is written up on Chengdu’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. Bethany Beach 72, Chengdu 5: Bethany Beach leads by 67 points.
Food & drink. Bethany Beach 35, Chengdu 86: Chengdu leads by 51 points.
Culture & sights. Bethany Beach 10, Chengdu 60: Chengdu leads by 50 points.
Nightlife. Bethany Beach 12, Chengdu 68: Chengdu leads by 56 points.
Nature & outdoors. Bethany Beach 48, Chengdu 68: Chengdu leads by 20 points.
Day trips. Bethany Beach 45, Chengdu 80: Chengdu leads by 35 points.
Good for families. Bethany Beach 66, Chengdu 65: Bethany Beach leads by 1 points.
Getting around. Bethany Beach 33, Chengdu 74: Chengdu leads by 41 points.
Shopping & style. Bethany Beach 28, Chengdu 64: Chengdu leads by 36 points.
Affordability. Bethany Beach 30, Chengdu 80: Chengdu leads by 50 points.
Live music & performing arts. Bethany Beach 14, Chengdu 50: Chengdu leads by 36 points.
Wellness & relaxation. Bethany Beach 33, Chengdu 58: Chengdu leads by 25 points.
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What lies behind each score is written up on the two cities’ own pages: Bethany Beach and Chengdu.

Your match

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

Bethany Beach
36match

Wins on beaches and families with your weighting.

Chengdu
Best match
63match

Wins on nightlife and food and drink with your weighting.

What matters to you?

When should you go?

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

Bethany Beach in July

31 °Cdaytime high
20 °Cnight-time low
95 mmrain in the month
No recordsunshine a day
23 °Csea
15 hdaylight a day

Chengdu in July

31 °Cdaytime high
23 °Cnight-time low
177 mmrain in the month
4 hsunshine a day
No seasea
14 hdaylight a day

Daytime high, °C

0°10°20°30°40°JFMAMJJASOND

Rainfall in the month, mm

050100150200250JFMAMJJASOND
Bethany BeachChengdu

Where the figures come from

Bethany Beach's temperatures are measured 45 km from the centre, at Salisbury / Quail Ridge.

Bethany Beach 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. Bethany Beach: 1991-2020 normals, Salisbury / Quail Ridge (44.9 km from centre). Chengdu: 1991-2020 normals, Chengdu (4.5 km from centre).

Before you go

MeasureBethany BeachChengdu
Official language-Putonghua
CurrencyUS Dollar (USD)Yuan Renminbi (CNY)
SocketsAB120 V, 60 HzACI220 V, 50 Hz
Driving sideRightRight
Time zoneUTC-5, UTC-4 in summerUTC+8
Emergency number911Police 110, ambulance 120, fire 119
Elevation3 m500 m
Main airportSalisbury Ocean City Wicomico Regional Airport (SBY)45 km from centre4 non-stop destinationsChengdu Shuangliu International Airport (CTU)16 km from centre77 non-stop destinations
Public holidays this year12 days6 days

By the numbers

MeasureBethany BeachChengdu
City population95420,937,757
People per km²3181,456
Museums within 10 km010
UNESCO World Heritage sites within 50 km00
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 Bethany Beach or Chengdu 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. 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.