VacationSelector
The Guggenheim Museum on the river, Bilbao
BilbaoThe Guggenheim Museum on the river
The floating torii of Itsukushima at Miyajima, Hiroshima
HiroshimaThe floating torii of Itsukushima at Miyajima

Photos: Bilbao by José Ligero Loarte, CC BY-SA 4.0, cropped; Hiroshima by Guohua Song, Pexels License.

Bilbao or Hiroshima?

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 Bilbao for

  • beaches
  • food and drink
  • live music and the arts

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

Choose Hiroshima for

  • wellness
  • prices
  • families

What lies behind each score is written up on Hiroshima’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. Bilbao 45, Hiroshima 30: Bilbao leads by 15 points.
Food & drink. Bilbao 81, Hiroshima 66: Bilbao leads by 15 points.
Culture & sights. Bilbao 62, Hiroshima 60: Bilbao leads by 2 points.
Nightlife. Bilbao 54, Hiroshima 45: Bilbao leads by 9 points.
Nature & outdoors. Bilbao 75, Hiroshima 62: Bilbao leads by 13 points.
Day trips. Bilbao 78, Hiroshima 80: Hiroshima leads by 2 points.
Good for families. Bilbao 55, Hiroshima 60: Hiroshima leads by 5 points.
Getting around. Bilbao 79, Hiroshima 74: Bilbao leads by 5 points.
Shopping & style. Bilbao 47, Hiroshima 52: Hiroshima leads by 5 points.
Affordability. Bilbao 44, Hiroshima 58: Hiroshima leads by 14 points.
Live music & performing arts. Bilbao 53, Hiroshima 38: Bilbao leads by 15 points.
Wellness & relaxation. Bilbao 33, Hiroshima 50: Hiroshima leads by 17 points.
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What lies behind each score is written up on the two cities’ own pages: Bilbao and Hiroshima.

Your match

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

Bilbao
Best match
59match

Wins on beaches and food and drink with your weighting.

Hiroshima
56match

Wins on wellness and prices with your weighting.

What matters to you?

When should you go?

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

Bilbao in July

25 °Cdaytime high
16 °Cnight-time low
54 mmrain in the month
6 hsunshine a day
21 °Csea
15 hdaylight a day

Hiroshima in July

31 °Cdaytime high
24 °Cnight-time low
299 mmrain in the month
6 hsunshine a day
24 °Csea
14 hdaylight a day

Daytime high, °C

0°10°20°30°40°JFMAMJJASOND

Rainfall in the month, mm

0100200300JFMAMJJASOND
BilbaoHiroshima

Temperature and rainfall are climate normals, averaged over the years shown. Bilbao: 1991-2020 normals, Bilbao / Sondica (4.1 km from centre). Hiroshima: 1991-2020 normals, Hiroshima (1.7 km from centre).

Before you go

MeasureBilbaoHiroshima
Official languageSpanishJapanese
CurrencyEuro (EUR)Yen (JPY)
SocketsCF230 V, 50 HzAB100 V, 50 and 60 Hz depending on the region
Driving sideRightLeft
Time zoneUTC+1, UTC+2 in summerUTC+9
Emergency number112Police 110, fire 119
Elevation19 m3 m
Main airportBilbao Airport (BIO)5 km from centre73 non-stop destinationsHiroshima Airport (HIJ)43 km from centre10 non-stop destinations
Public holidays this year13 days16 days

By the numbers

MeasureBilbaoHiroshima
City population351,1241,198,021
People per km²8,4401,324
Museums within 10 km1718
UNESCO World Heritage sites within 50 km22
Swim season, months above 21 °C1 month4 months

Where else could you go?

Every comparison below shares a destination with this one, so you can follow Bilbao or Hiroshima 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. Ground elevations sampled from the Mapzen terrain tiles via OpenTopoData, merging SRTM, ASTER, NED, EU-DEM and national sources. Exchange rates via Frankfurter, based on European Central Bank reference rates. 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.