VacationSelector
The Guggenheim Museum on the river, Bilbao
BilbaoThe Guggenheim Museum on the river
Bougainvillea and the dome of Agia Napa Cathedral, Limassol
LimassolBougainvillea and the dome of Agia Napa Cathedral

Photos: Bilbao by José Ligero Loarte, CC BY-SA 4.0, cropped; Limassol by Julian Lupyan, CC0.

Bilbao or Limassol?

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

  • getting around
  • culture and sights
  • food and drink

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

Choose Limassol for

  • beaches
  • wellness
  • families

What lies behind each score is written up on Limassol’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, Limassol 77: Limassol leads by 32 points.
Food & drink. Bilbao 81, Limassol 58: Bilbao leads by 23 points.
Culture & sights. Bilbao 62, Limassol 38: Bilbao leads by 24 points.
Nightlife. Bilbao 54, Limassol 50: Bilbao leads by 4 points.
Nature & outdoors. Bilbao 75, Limassol 65: Bilbao leads by 10 points.
Day trips. Bilbao 78, Limassol 76: Bilbao leads by 2 points.
Good for families. Bilbao 55, Limassol 63: Limassol leads by 8 points.
Getting around. Bilbao 79, Limassol 38: Bilbao leads by 41 points.
Shopping & style. Bilbao 47, Limassol 42: Bilbao leads by 5 points.
Affordability. Bilbao and Limassol are level on 44.
Live music & performing arts. Bilbao 53, Limassol 32: Bilbao leads by 21 points.
Wellness & relaxation. Bilbao 33, Limassol 42: Limassol leads by 9 points.
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What lies behind each score is written up on the two cities’ own pages: Bilbao and Limassol.

Your match

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

Bilbao
Best match
59match

Wins on getting around and culture and sights with your weighting.

Limassol
52match

Wins on beaches and wellness 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

Limassol in July

31 °Cdaytime high
24 °Cnight-time low
1 mmrain in the month
13 hsunshine a day
26 °Csea
14 hdaylight a day

Daytime high, °C

0°10°20°30°40°JFMAMJJASOND

Rainfall in the month, mm

050100150200JFMAMJJASOND
BilbaoLimassol

Where the figures come from

Limassol 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.

Limassol's sunshine is measured 59 km from the centre, at Larnaca Airport.

Temperature and rainfall are climate normals, averaged over the years shown. Bilbao: 1991-2020 normals, Bilbao / Sondica (4.1 km from centre). Limassol: 1998-2020 (sunshine 1991-2020, rainfall 1991-2020) normals, Akrotiri (11.6 km from centre).

Before you go

MeasureBilbaoLimassol
Official languageSpanishTurkish, Greek, Modern Greek
CurrencyEuro (EUR)Euro (EUR)
SocketsCF230 V, 50 HzG240 V, 50 Hz
Driving sideRightLeft
Time zoneUTC+1, UTC+2 in summerUTC+2, UTC+3 in summer
Emergency number112112
Elevation19 m10 m
Main airportBilbao Airport (BIO)5 km from centre73 non-stop destinationsLarnaca International Airport (LCA)58 km from centre112 non-stop destinations
Public holidays this year13 days17 days

By the numbers

MeasureBilbaoLimassol
City population351,124107,970
People per km²8,4402,405
Museums within 10 km172
UNESCO World Heritage sites within 50 km23
Swim season, months above 21 °C1 month6 months

Where else could you go?

Every comparison below shares a destination with this one, so you can follow Bilbao or Limassol 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. Daylight hours computed from each destination's latitude using the NOAA solar position algorithm. Exchange rates via Frankfurter, based on European Central Bank reference rates.

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.