Bologna or Florence?
Two destinations compared on nine measures of openly sourced data. Weight what matters to you and the verdict follows.
Your match
Wins on good for families and nature & day trips with your weighting.
Wins on museums & heritage and sights concentration with your weighting.
What matters to you?
Pick a travel style or drag the sliders. The match scores above update as you do.
The verdict
Choose Bologna if you want a city that works for a slower trip: more park space close to the centre, a wider range of kitchens, and drier summers, with 5 months at 40mm of rain or less.
Choose Florence if museums and heritage drive the trip. It has about twice as many museums and roughly twice as many notable places within walking distance of the centre.
Scoreboard
Each measure scored 0 to 100. Open a row for the figures behind the score.
Beaches & swimming. Bologna and Florence are level on 0.
| Bologna | Florence | |
|---|---|---|
| Score | 0 | 0 |
| Swim season months | 0 | 0 |
| Beaches 10 km | 2 | 0 |
| Coast distance | 74 km | 78 km |
| Water distance | — | — |
Places to eat. Florence leads by 1 points.1
| Bologna | Florence | |
|---|---|---|
| Score | 58 | 59 |
| Restaurants within 2 km of centre | 822 | 1,299 |
| Effective number of cuisines within 2 km | 20 | 15 |
Museums & heritage. Florence leads by 15 points.15
| Bologna | Florence | |
|---|---|---|
| Score | 67 | 82 |
| Museums within 10 km | 58 | 132 |
| Museums within 2 km of centre | 43 | 93 |
| Share of museums within 2 km % | 74 | 70 |
| Unesco sites within 50 km | 3 | 4 |
Nightlife. Florence leads by 3 points.3
| Bologna | Florence | |
|---|---|---|
| Score | 53 | 56 |
| Drinking venues within 4 km | 720 | 818 |
| Drinking venues within 2 km of centre | 531 | 599 |
| Share of drinking venues within 2 km % | 74 | 73 |
| Nightclubs within 4 km | 30 | 34 |
Nature & day trips. Bologna leads by 1 points.1
| Bologna | Florence | |
|---|---|---|
| Score | 39 | 38 |
| Protected land share 50 km % | 7 | 9 |
| Landscape blanket share 50 km % | 1 | 2 |
| Land share of disc % | 100 | 100 |
| Park area within 2 km | 119 hectares | 86 hectares |
Good for families. Bologna leads by 3 points.3
| Bologna | Florence | |
|---|---|---|
| Score | 55 | 52 |
| Tourist attractions within 2 km | 32 | 30 |
| Park area within 2 km | 119 hectares | 86 hectares |
| Theme parks within 30 km | 0 | 0 |
Sights concentration. Florence leads by 15 points.15
| Bologna | Florence | |
|---|---|---|
| Score | 60 | 75 |
| Notable places within 2 km | 120 | 292 |
| Min wikipedia languages | 5 | 5 |
Value for money. Bologna and Florence are level on 68.
| Bologna | Florence | |
|---|---|---|
| Score | 68 | 68 |
| Price level global | 64.9 | 64.9 |
| Daily budget | €155 | €155 |
Year-round weather. Florence leads by 1 points.1
| Bologna | Florence | |
|---|---|---|
| Score | 67 | 68 |
| Monthly daytime high | 7 °C to 31.5 °C | 10.8 °C to 32.7 °C |
| Monthly rainfall | 34 mm to 75 mm | 32 mm to 132 mm |
| Dry months | 5 | 2 |
Where they differ
Bologna has somewhat more park space near the centre and about as many tourist attractions close by, which makes it easier for unstructured days with children. Its kitchens cover a wider range.
Florence has about twice as many museums and about twice as many notable places within walking distance of the centre, so more of the sightseeing is done on foot. It also counts 4 UNESCO-listed places within day-trip reach against Bologna's 3, and about twice as many restaurants near the centre.
Where they are alike
Neither is a swimming destination. Bologna has 2 beaches within reach and Florence none, but neither has a month with sea at 21°C or more, so either trip is planned around the city.
Both are hot in high summer, reaching 32-33°C, and both sit inland with limited protected land nearby, 9% around Florence and 7% around Bologna. Eating out is a strength in each, and their drinking and nightclub scenes are similar in size and close to the centre.
Which traveller are you?
Museum-led traveller: Florence. It has about twice as many museums as Bologna and 4 UNESCO-listed places within day-trip reach against 3, and its notable sights cluster tightly enough to cover several in a day on foot.
Families with young children: Bologna. Both cities have a similar spread of attractions near the centre and neither has a theme park within reach, but Bologna has more park space close in, and 2 beaches nearby.
Eating and going out: either works. Florence puts more restaurants within reach of the centre; Bologna covers more kinds of cooking. Bars and clubs are comparable in number and central in both cities.
What the numbers don't tell you
The value comparison between these two carries no information: both rest on the same national price level, so that figure is identical by construction. The €155 daily budget beside it is one national estimate, not a measurement of either city, and it says nothing about which trip will cost more.
Florence's density cuts both ways: the compact centre that puts its museums within walking distance of one another also concentrates visitors in a small area. And warmth and dryness do not coincide there; September is still warm at 27°C but brings 102mm of rain, so a month that reads as summer can be a wet one.
When should you go?
The figures behind each month. Each row is shaded against that destination's own year, so the deepest cell is its best month for that measure and the palest its weakest. Shades are not comparable between the two rows.
Temperature and rainfall are thirty-year climate normals, averaged over the years shown. Bologna: 1991-2020 normals, Bologna / Borgo Panigale (5.5 km from centre). Florence: 1995-2020 (sunshine 1991-2020, rainfall 1991-2020) normals, Firenze / Peretola (5.6 km from centre).
Bologna is the drier of the two. Its best stretch runs May to September, with hot, low-rain midsummer near 32°C and 34mm, and the wettest months of autumn still lighter than Florence's.
Florence is the better winter and early-spring choice, with January highs near 11°C against Bologna's 7°C. Late spring is its strongest stretch, warm at 24-29°C. Autumn is the drawback: October and November bring 125-132mm of rain, roughly twice Bologna's.
Getting there
| Flying from | Bologna | Florence |
|---|---|---|
| ParisCDG, ORY, BVA | 1 h 40 m €158-262 1 stop BLQ · 6 km | 1 h 40 m €143-159 FLR · 6 km |
| TiranaTIA | 1 h 35 m €96-199 BLQ · 6 km | 1 h 35 m no fares PSA · 70 km |
| LondonLHR, LGW, STN, LTN +2 | 2 h 0 m €114-267 BLQ · 6 km | 2 h 5 m €180-199 1 stop FLR · 6 km |
| BarcelonaBCN | 1 h 40 m €42-75 BLQ · 6 km | 1 h 35 m €113-168 FLR · 6 km |
| CataniaCTA | 1 h 40 m €41-45 BLQ · 6 km | 1 h 35 m €135-156 FLR · 6 km |
| AmsterdamAMS | 1 h 50 m no fares BLQ · 6 km | 1 h 55 m €232-255 2 stops FLR · 6 km |
| RomeFCO, CIA | 1 h 0 m no fares BLQ · 6 km | 55 m €136-139 1 stop FLR · 6 km |
| MadridMAD | 2 h 10 m no fares BLQ · 6 km | 2 h 10 m no fares FLR · 6 km |
| FrankfurtFRA, HHN | 1 h 25 m no fares BLQ · 6 km | 1 h 30 m no fares FLR · 6 km |
| CasablancaCMN | 3 h 5 m €180-238 1 stop BLQ · 6 km | 3 h 5 m €180-238 1 stop BLQ · 85 km |
The busiest departure cities for these two, with a place kept for each other part of the world. Busiest means arriving passengers where an official count exists, and where none does, the number of non-stop services flown: official route statistics are published by the European reporting countries and by nobody else, so a table ranked on them alone would offer a reader in New York or Tokyo ten European cities. Flying times are estimated from the distance between airports, and every row is a city flown non-stop to both. Where the typical offer connects anyway, the stops are shown. Under each figure is the airport the flight lands at and how far that is from the centre, because the nearest airport is not always the one a route is flown to. Where both columns name the same airport it is one flight, and the difference between the two is the distance printed beside it. Typical return fares for 2026-08 to 2026-10, cached market data up to 7 days old. The figure is the middle half of the offers found, so a single price means they agreed and a range means they did not; for a typical route that middle half spans about a quarter of the median, and for the least settled routes rather more than the median itself.
Before you go
| Measure | Bologna | Florence |
|---|---|---|
| Official language | Italian | Italian |
| Currency | Euro (EUR) | Euro (EUR) |
| Sockets | CFL230 V, 50 Hz | CFL230 V, 50 Hz |
| Driving side | Right | Right |
| Time zone | UTC+1, UTC+2 in summer | UTC+1, UTC+2 in summer |
| Emergency number | 112 | 112 |
| Elevation | 54 m | 50 m |
| Main airport | Bologna Guglielmo Marconi Airport (BLQ)6 km from centre97 non-stop destinations | Florence Airport, Peretola (FLR)6 km from centre36 non-stop destinations |
| Public holidays this year | 13 days | 13 days |
By the numbers
| Measure | Bologna | Florence |
|---|---|---|
| City population | 387,971 | 360,930 |
| People per km² | 2,754 | 3,528 |
| Museums within 10 km | 66 | 140 |
| UNESCO World Heritage sites within 50 km | 3 | 4 |
| Distinct cuisines in the centre | 62 | 62 |
Where else could you go?
Every comparison below shares a destination with this one, so you can follow Bologna or Florence somewhere new.