VacationSelector
The Story Bridge from Howard Smith Wharves, Brisbane
BrisbaneThe Story Bridge from Howard Smith Wharves
Clearwater Beach in evening light, with its hotels and pier, Clearwater
ClearwaterClearwater Beach in evening light, with its hotels and pier

Photos: Brisbane by Kgbo, CC BY-SA 4.0, cropped; Clearwater by ajay_suresh, CC BY 2.0, cropped.

Brisbane or Clearwater?

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 Brisbane for

  • getting around
  • culture and sights
  • food and drink

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

Choose Clearwater for

  • beaches
  • day trips
  • prices

What lies behind each score is written up on Clearwater’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. Brisbane 55, Clearwater 90: Clearwater leads by 35 points.
Food & drink. Brisbane 60, Clearwater 38: Brisbane leads by 22 points.
Culture & sights. Brisbane 42, Clearwater 18: Brisbane leads by 24 points.
Nightlife. Brisbane 55, Clearwater 34: Brisbane leads by 21 points.
Nature & outdoors. Brisbane 74, Clearwater 55: Brisbane leads by 19 points.
Day trips. Brisbane 50, Clearwater 58: Clearwater leads by 8 points.
Good for families. Brisbane and Clearwater are level on 78.
Getting around. Brisbane 62, Clearwater 28: Brisbane leads by 34 points.
Shopping & style. Brisbane 45, Clearwater 27: Brisbane leads by 18 points.
Affordability. Brisbane 33, Clearwater 35: Clearwater leads by 2 points.
Live music & performing arts. Brisbane 55, Clearwater 36: Brisbane leads by 19 points.
Wellness & relaxation. Brisbane and Clearwater are level on 40.
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What lies behind each score is written up on the two cities’ own pages: Brisbane and Clearwater.

Your match

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

Brisbane
Best match
54match

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

Clearwater
45match

Wins on beaches and day trips with your weighting.

What matters to you?

When should you go?

Pick your month. The climate figures are measured averages, not a forecast.

Brisbane in July

22 °Cdaytime high
10 °Cnight-time low
27 mmrain in the month
8 hsunshine a day
20 °Csea
11 hdaylight a day

Clearwater in July

32 °Cdaytime high
25 °Cnight-time low
188 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
BrisbaneClearwater

Where the figures come from

Clearwater 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.

Clearwater's sunshine is measured 26 km from the centre, at Tampa International Airport.

Temperature and rainfall are climate normals, averaged over the years shown. Brisbane: 1991-2020 normals, Brisbane (4.5 km from centre). Clearwater: 2006-2020 (sunshine 1991-2020, rainfall 1991-2020) normals, Saint Petersburg / High Point (12.7 km from centre).

Before you go

MeasureBrisbaneClearwater
Official languageEnglish-
CurrencyAustralian Dollar (AUD)US Dollar (USD)
SocketsI230 V, 50 HzAB120 V, 60 Hz
Driving sideLeftRight
Time zoneUTC+10UTC-5, UTC-4 in summer
Emergency number000911
Elevation0 m9 m
Main airportBrisbane International Airport (BNE)13 km from centre88 non-stop destinationsSt. Petersburg Clearwater International Airport (PIE)13 km from centre60 non-stop destinations
Public holidays this year11 days11 days

By the numbers

MeasureBrisbaneClearwater
City population2,706,966117,292
People per km²1711,154
Museums within 10 km164
UNESCO World Heritage sites within 50 km00
Swim season, months above 21 °C9 months8 months

Where else could you go?

Every comparison below shares a destination with this one, so you can follow Brisbane or Clearwater 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.