VacationSelector
The CEC Palace on Calea Victoriei, Bucharest
BucharestThe CEC Palace on Calea Victoriei
Cardiff Castle, Cardiff
CardiffCardiff Castle

Photos: Bucharest by Jorge Láscar, CC BY 2.0, cropped; Cardiff by Tevfik Teker, CC BY 3.0, cropped.

Bucharest or Cardiff?

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 Bucharest for

  • prices
  • nightlife
  • wellness

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

Choose Cardiff for

  • nature and the outdoors
  • beaches
  • day trips

What lies behind each score is written up on Cardiff’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. Bucharest 8, Cardiff 30: Cardiff leads by 22 points.
Food & drink. Bucharest 55, Cardiff 45: Bucharest leads by 10 points.
Culture & sights. Bucharest and Cardiff are level on 58.
Nightlife. Bucharest 70, Cardiff 50: Bucharest leads by 20 points.
Nature & outdoors. Bucharest 45, Cardiff 70: Cardiff leads by 25 points.
Day trips. Bucharest 52, Cardiff 72: Cardiff leads by 20 points.
Good for families. Bucharest 52, Cardiff 58: Cardiff leads by 6 points.
Getting around. Bucharest 52, Cardiff 66: Cardiff leads by 14 points.
Shopping & style. Bucharest 45, Cardiff 50: Cardiff leads by 5 points.
Affordability. Bucharest 70, Cardiff 46: Bucharest leads by 24 points.
Live music & performing arts. Bucharest 60, Cardiff 57: Bucharest leads by 3 points.
Wellness & relaxation. Bucharest 47, Cardiff 27: Bucharest leads by 20 points.
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What lies behind each score is written up on the two cities’ own pages: Bucharest and Cardiff.

Your match

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

Too close to call, 1 point apart

Bucharest
51match

Wins on prices and nightlife with your weighting.

Cardiff
52match

Wins on nature and the outdoors and beaches with your weighting.

What matters to you?

When should you go?

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

Bucharest in July

30 °Cdaytime high
16 °Cnight-time low
68 mmrain in the month
10 hsunshine a day
No seasea
15 hdaylight a day

Cardiff in July

20 °Cdaytime high
13 °Cnight-time low
83 mmrain in the month
7 hsunshine a day
17 °Csea
16 hdaylight a day

Daytime high, °C

0°10°20°30°40°JFMAMJJASOND

Rainfall in the month, mm

050100150JFMAMJJASOND
BucharestCardiff

Where the figures come from

Cardiff 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.

Cardiff's sunshine is measured 83 km from the centre, at Lyneham.

Temperature and rainfall are climate normals, averaged over the years shown. Bucharest: 1991-2020 normals, Bucuresti / Imh (10 km from centre). Cardiff: 1991-2020 normals, Cardiff-Wales Airport (14.9 km from centre).

Before you go

MeasureBucharestCardiff
Official languageRomanianEnglish
CurrencyRomanian Leu (RON)Pound Sterling (GBP)
SocketsCF230 V, 50 HzG230 V, 50 Hz
Driving sideRightLeft
Time zoneUTC+2, UTC+3 in summerUTC, UTC+1 in summer
Emergency number112112 or 999
Elevation70 m41 m
Main airportBucharest Henri Coandă International Airport (OTP)18 km from centre121 non-stop destinationsCardiff International Airport (CWL)15 km from centre30 non-stop destinations
Public holidays this year17 days8 days

By the numbers

MeasureBucharestCardiff
City population1,716,961383,536
People per km²7,5972,734
Museums within 10 km419
UNESCO World Heritage sites within 50 km01
Swim season, months above 21 °C-None

Where else could you go?

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