VacationSelector
The Massachusetts State House, Boston
BostonThe Massachusetts State House
The pink Don CeSar hotel seen from the beach, St. Pete Beach
St. Pete BeachThe pink Don CeSar hotel seen from the beach

Photos: Boston by Ajay Suresh, CC BY 2.0, cropped; St. Pete Beach by Jeffrey Eisen, Pexels License.

Boston or St. Pete Beach?

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 Boston for

  • culture and sights
  • live music and the arts
  • getting around

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

Choose St. Pete Beach for

  • beaches
  • prices
  • wellness

What lies behind each score is written up on St. Pete Beach’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. Boston 35, St. Pete Beach 87: St. Pete Beach leads by 52 points.
Food & drink. Boston 64, St. Pete Beach 40: Boston leads by 24 points.
Culture & sights. Boston 72, St. Pete Beach 18: Boston leads by 54 points.
Nightlife. Boston 47, St. Pete Beach 28: Boston leads by 19 points.
Nature & outdoors. Boston 60, St. Pete Beach 57: Boston leads by 3 points.
Day trips. Boston 72, St. Pete Beach 58: Boston leads by 14 points.
Good for families. Boston and St. Pete Beach are level on 72.
Getting around. Boston 70, St. Pete Beach 30: Boston leads by 40 points.
Shopping & style. Boston 55, St. Pete Beach 20: Boston leads by 35 points.
Affordability. Boston 18, St. Pete Beach 32: St. Pete Beach leads by 14 points.
Live music & performing arts. Boston 72, St. Pete Beach 20: Boston leads by 52 points.
Wellness & relaxation. Boston 30, St. Pete Beach 42: St. Pete Beach leads by 12 points.
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What lies behind each score is written up on the two cities’ own pages: Boston and St. Pete Beach.

Your match

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

Boston
Best match
56match

Wins on culture and sights and live music and the arts with your weighting.

St. Pete Beach
42match

Wins on beaches 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.

Boston in July

28 °Cdaytime high
19 °Cnight-time low
82 mmrain in the month
9 hsunshine a day
18 °Csea
15 hdaylight a day

St. Pete Beach in July

32 °Cdaytime high
26 °Cnight-time low
185 mmrain in the month
9 hsunshine a day
30 °Csea
14 hdaylight a day

Daytime high, °C

0°10°20°30°40°JFMAMJJASOND

Rainfall in the month, mm

050100150200250JFMAMJJASOND
BostonSt. Pete Beach

Where the figures come from

St. Pete Beach 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.

St. Pete Beach's sunshine is measured 34 km from the centre, at Tampa International Airport.

Temperature and rainfall are climate normals, averaged over the years shown. Boston: 1991-2020 normals, Boston Logan International (3.5 km from centre). St. Pete Beach: 1998-2020 (sunshine 1991-2020, rainfall 1991-2020) normals, Saint Petersburg (12.2 km from centre).

Before you go

MeasureBostonSt. Pete Beach
CurrencyUS Dollar (USD)US Dollar (USD)
SocketsAB120 V, 60 HzAB120 V, 60 Hz
Driving sideRightRight
Time zoneUTC-5, UTC-4 in summerUTC-5, UTC-4 in summer
Emergency number911911
Elevation43 m2 m
Main airportBoston Logan International Airport (BOS)4 km from centre144 non-stop destinationsSt. Petersburg Clearwater International Airport (PIE)21 km from centre60 non-stop destinations
Public holidays this year12 days11 days

By the numbers

MeasureBostonSt. Pete Beach
City population675,6478,879
People per km²2,910173
Museums within 10 km512
UNESCO World Heritage sites within 50 km00
Swim season, months above 21 °CNone8 months

Where else could you go?

Every comparison below shares a destination with this one, so you can follow Boston or St. Pete Beach 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). Public holidays from Nager.Date (MIT). Exchange rates via Frankfurter, based on European Central Bank reference rates. 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. 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 2026-11-02. Daily budgets are estimates from country price levels.