VacationSelector
The Guggenheim Museum on the river, Bilbao
BilbaoThe Guggenheim Museum on the river
The adobe New Mexico Museum of Art, Santa Fe
Santa FeThe adobe New Mexico Museum of Art

Photos: Bilbao by José Ligero Loarte, CC BY-SA 4.0, cropped; Santa Fe by dconvertini, CC BY-SA 2.0, cropped.

Bilbao or Santa Fe?

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
  • getting around
  • nightlife

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

Choose Santa Fe for

  • wellness
  • shopping
  • nature and the outdoors

What lies behind each score is written up on Santa Fe’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, Santa Fe 5: Bilbao leads by 40 points.
Food & drink. Bilbao 81, Santa Fe 62: Bilbao leads by 19 points.
Culture & sights. Bilbao 62, Santa Fe 66: Santa Fe leads by 4 points.
Nightlife. Bilbao 54, Santa Fe 22: Bilbao leads by 32 points.
Nature & outdoors. Bilbao 75, Santa Fe 80: Santa Fe leads by 5 points.
Day trips. Bilbao 78, Santa Fe 70: Bilbao leads by 8 points.
Good for families. Bilbao 55, Santa Fe 45: Bilbao leads by 10 points.
Getting around. Bilbao 79, Santa Fe 40: Bilbao leads by 39 points.
Shopping & style. Bilbao 47, Santa Fe 62: Santa Fe leads by 15 points.
Affordability. Bilbao 44, Santa Fe 30: Bilbao leads by 14 points.
Live music & performing arts. Bilbao 53, Santa Fe 55: Santa Fe leads by 2 points.
Wellness & relaxation. Bilbao 33, Santa Fe 55: Santa Fe leads by 22 points.
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What lies behind each score is written up on the two cities’ own pages: Bilbao and Santa Fe.

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 getting around with your weighting.

Santa Fe
49match

Wins on wellness and shopping 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

Santa Fe in July

31 °Cdaytime high
16 °Cnight-time low
60 mmrain in the month
No recordsunshine a day
No seasea
14 hdaylight a day

Daytime high, °C

0°10°20°30°40°JFMAMJJASOND

Rainfall in the month, mm

050100150200JFMAMJJASOND
BilbaoSanta Fe

Where the figures come from

Santa Fe's station stands 199 m below the city centre, so the centre is likely a little cooler than the figures say.

Santa Fe 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. Bilbao: 1991-2020 normals, Bilbao / Sondica (4.1 km from centre). Santa Fe: 1991-2020 normals, Santa Fe / Cieneguilla (12.4 km from centre).

Before you go

MeasureBilbaoSanta Fe
Official languageSpanish-
CurrencyEuro (EUR)US Dollar (USD)
SocketsCF230 V, 50 HzAB120 V, 60 Hz
Driving sideRightRight
Time zoneUTC+1, UTC+2 in summerUTC-7, UTC-6 in summer
Emergency number112911
Elevation19 m2,134 m
Main airportBilbao Airport (BIO)5 km from centre73 non-stop destinationsSanta Fe Municipal Airport (SAF)12 km from centre5 non-stop destinations
Public holidays this year13 days13 days

By the numbers

MeasureBilbaoSanta Fe
City population351,12487,505
People per km²8,440645
Museums within 10 km1710
UNESCO World Heritage sites within 50 km20
Swim season, months above 21 °C1 month-

Where else could you go?

Every comparison below shares a destination with this one, so you can follow Bilbao or Santa Fe 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. 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 2026-11-01. Daily budgets are estimates from country price levels.