VacationSelector
San Petronio on Piazza Maggiore, Bologna
BolognaSan Petronio on Piazza Maggiore
The Big Buddha on the hill above Phuket, Phuket
PhuketThe Big Buddha on the hill above Phuket

Photos: Bologna by Vanni Lazzari, CC BY-SA 4.0, cropped; Phuket by Mussi Katz, CC0.

Bologna or Phuket?

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 Bologna for

  • getting around
  • day trips
  • culture and sights

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

Choose Phuket for

  • beaches
  • wellness
  • nature and the outdoors

What lies behind each score is written up on Phuket’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. Bologna 30, Phuket 90: Phuket leads by 60 points.
Food & drink. Bologna 82, Phuket 66: Bologna leads by 16 points.
Culture & sights. Bologna 77, Phuket 35: Bologna leads by 42 points.
Nightlife. Bologna 58, Phuket 72: Phuket leads by 14 points.
Nature & outdoors. Bologna 52, Phuket 80: Phuket leads by 28 points.
Day trips. Bologna 95, Phuket 45: Bologna leads by 50 points.
Good for families. Bologna 50, Phuket 65: Phuket leads by 15 points.
Getting around. Bologna 76, Phuket 22: Bologna leads by 54 points.
Shopping & style. Bologna 55, Phuket 42: Bologna leads by 13 points.
Affordability. Bologna 48, Phuket 68: Phuket leads by 20 points.
Live music & performing arts. Bologna 60, Phuket 20: Bologna leads by 40 points.
Wellness & relaxation. Bologna 40, Phuket 82: Phuket leads by 42 points.
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What lies behind each score is written up on the two cities’ own pages: Bologna and Phuket.

Your match

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

Bologna
Best match
60match

Wins on getting around and day trips with your weighting.

Phuket
57match

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.

Bologna in July

32 °Cdaytime high
20 °Cnight-time low
39 mmrain in the month
11 hsunshine a day
No seasea
15 hdaylight a day

Phuket in July

32 °Cdaytime high
24 °Cnight-time low
287 mmrain in the month
No recordsunshine a day
30 °Csea
13 hdaylight a day

Daytime high, °C

0°10°20°30°40°JFMAMJJASOND

Rainfall in the month, mm

0100200300400JFMAMJJASOND
BolognaPhuket

Where the figures come from

Bologna 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.

Bologna's sunshine is measured 82 km from the centre, at Cervia.

Phuket's temperatures are measured 27 km from the centre, at Phuket Airport.

Temperature and rainfall are climate normals, averaged over the years shown. Bologna: 1991-2020 normals, Bologna / Borgo Panigale (5.5 km from centre). Phuket: 1991-2020 (rainfall 1961-1990) normals, Phuket Airport (26.9 km from centre).

Before you go

MeasureBolognaPhuket
Official languageItalianThai
CurrencyEuro (EUR)Baht (THB)
SocketsCFL230 V, 50 HzABCF220 V, 50 Hz
Driving sideRightLeft
Time zoneUTC+1, UTC+2 in summerUTC+7
Emergency number112Police 191, ambulance 1669, fire 199
Elevation54 m19 m
Main airportBologna Guglielmo Marconi Airport (BLQ)6 km from centre98 non-stop destinationsPhuket International Airport (HKT)27 km from centre85 non-stop destinations
Public holidays this year13 days-

By the numbers

MeasureBolognaPhuket
City population387,97177,610
People per km²2,7546,468
Museums within 10 km682
UNESCO World Heritage sites within 50 km30
Swim season, months above 21 °C-12 months

Where else could you go?

Every comparison below shares a destination with this one, so you can follow Bologna or Phuket 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. 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. Sea surface temperature from NOAA OISST v2.1, NOAA Physical Sciences Laboratory. 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.