VacationSelector
The beach with its parasols and the boardwalk, Bethany Beach
Bethany BeachThe beach with its parasols and the boardwalk
The main beach with the green hills behind, Sayulita
SayulitaThe main beach with the green hills behind

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

Bethany Beach 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 Bethany Beach for

  • families
  • culture and sights
  • day trips

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

Choose Sayulita for

  • wellness
  • nature and the outdoors
  • nightlife

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. Bethany Beach 72, Sayulita 80: Sayulita leads by 8 points.
Food & drink. Bethany Beach 35, Sayulita 42: Sayulita leads by 7 points.
Culture & sights. Bethany Beach 10, Sayulita 7: Bethany Beach leads by 3 points.
Nightlife. Bethany Beach 12, Sayulita 33: Sayulita leads by 21 points.
Nature & outdoors. Bethany Beach 48, Sayulita 72: Sayulita leads by 24 points.
Day trips. Bethany Beach 45, Sayulita 42: Bethany Beach leads by 3 points.
Good for families. Bethany Beach 66, Sayulita 42: Bethany Beach leads by 24 points.
Getting around. Bethany Beach 33, Sayulita 48: Sayulita leads by 15 points.
Shopping & style. Bethany Beach 28, Sayulita 33: Sayulita leads by 5 points.
Affordability. Bethany Beach 30, Sayulita 45: Sayulita leads by 15 points.
Live music & performing arts. Bethany Beach 14, Sayulita 12: Bethany Beach leads by 2 points.
Wellness & relaxation. Bethany Beach 33, Sayulita 58: Sayulita leads by 25 points.
0255075100

What lies behind each score is written up on the two cities’ own pages: Bethany Beach and Sayulita.

Your match

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

Bethany Beach
36match

Wins on families and culture and sights with your weighting.

Sayulita
Best match
43match

Wins on wellness 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.

Bethany Beach in July

31 °Cdaytime high
20 °Cnight-time low
95 mmrain in the month
23 °Csea
15 hdaylight a day

Sayulita in July

29 °Cdaytime high
27 °Cnight-time low
342 mmrain in the month
30 °Csea
13 hdaylight a day

Daytime high, °C

0°10°20°30°40°JFMAMJJASOND

Rainfall in the month, mm

0100200300400JFMAMJJASOND
Bethany BeachSayulita

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.

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. Bethany Beach: 1991-2020 normals, Salisbury / Quail Ridge (44.9 km from centre). Sayulita: 2001-2020 normals, NASA POWER reanalysis grid, no weather station within 90 km.

Before you go

MeasureBethany BeachSayulita
Official language-Spanish, Nahuatl, Yucatec Maya
CurrencyUS Dollar (USD)Mexican Peso (MXN)
SocketsAB120 V, 60 HzAB127 V, 60 Hz
Driving sideRightRight
Time zoneUTC-5, UTC-4 in summerUTC-6
Emergency number911911
Elevation3 m2 m
Main airportSalisbury Ocean City Wicomico Regional Airport (SBY)45 km from centre4 non-stop destinationsPuerto Vallarta International Airport (PVR)29 km from centre52 non-stop destinations
Public holidays this year12 days9 days

By the numbers

MeasureBethany BeachSayulita
City population9543,390
People per km²318-
Museums within 10 km00
UNESCO World Heritage sites within 50 km01
Swim season, months above 21 °C3 months12 months

Where else could you go?

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