VacationSelector
The Teatro Colón, Buenos Aires
Buenos AiresThe Teatro Colón
Cloud Gate in Millennium Park, Chicago
ChicagoCloud Gate in Millennium Park

Photos: Buenos Aires by Bernard Gagnon, CC BY-SA 4.0, cropped; Chicago by Jesus Toledo, Pexels License.

Buenos Aires or Chicago?

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 Buenos Aires for

  • prices
  • nightlife
  • day trips

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

Choose Chicago for

  • beaches
  • families
  • nature and the outdoors

What lies behind each score is written up on Chicago’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. Buenos Aires 7, Chicago 50: Chicago leads by 43 points.
Food & drink. Buenos Aires 75, Chicago 80: Chicago leads by 5 points.
Culture & sights. Buenos Aires 71, Chicago 78: Chicago leads by 7 points.
Nightlife. Buenos Aires 95, Chicago 77: Buenos Aires leads by 18 points.
Nature & outdoors. Buenos Aires 38, Chicago 48: Chicago leads by 10 points.
Day trips. Buenos Aires 60, Chicago 42: Buenos Aires leads by 18 points.
Good for families. Buenos Aires 52, Chicago 78: Chicago leads by 26 points.
Getting around. Buenos Aires 62, Chicago 72: Chicago leads by 10 points.
Shopping & style. Buenos Aires 60, Chicago 70: Chicago leads by 10 points.
Affordability. Buenos Aires 55, Chicago 33: Buenos Aires leads by 22 points.
Live music & performing arts. Buenos Aires 75, Chicago 82: Chicago leads by 7 points.
Wellness & relaxation. Buenos Aires 28, Chicago 33: Chicago leads by 5 points.
0255075100

What lies behind each score is written up on the two cities’ own pages: Buenos Aires and Chicago.

Your match

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

Buenos Aires
57match

Wins on prices and nightlife with your weighting.

Chicago
Best match
62match

Wins on beaches and families with your weighting.

What matters to you?

When should you go?

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

Buenos Aires in July

15 °Cdaytime high
8 °Cnight-time low
50 mmrain in the month
5 hsunshine a day
13 °Csea
10 hdaylight a day

Chicago in July

29 °Cdaytime high
20 °Cnight-time low
102 mmrain in the month
No recordsunshine a day
21 °Csea
15 hdaylight a day

Daytime high, °C

0°10°20°30°JFMAMJJASOND

Rainfall in the month, mm

050100150JFMAMJJASOND
Buenos AiresChicago

Temperature and rainfall are climate normals, averaged over the years shown. Buenos Aires: 1991-2020 normals, Aeroparque Bs. As. Aerodrome (4.9 km from centre). Chicago: 1991-2020 normals, Chicago Midway Airport (14.5 km from centre).

Before you go

MeasureBuenos AiresChicago
Official languageSpanish-
CurrencyArgentine Peso (ARS)US Dollar (USD)
SocketsCI220 V, 50 HzAB120 V, 60 Hz
Driving sideLeftRight
Time zoneUTC-3UTC-6, UTC-5 in summer
Emergency number117 or 911911
Elevation25 m179 m
Main airportEzeiza International Airport - Ministro Pistarini (EZE)28 km from centre48 non-stop destinationsChicago O'Hare International Airport (ORD)25 km from centre274 non-stop destinations
Public holidays this year16 days13 days

By the numbers

MeasureBuenos AiresChicago
City population3,121,7072,746,388
People per km²15,3554,529
Museums within 10 km7644
UNESCO World Heritage sites within 50 km11
Swim season, months above 21 °C4 months1 month

Where else could you go?

Every comparison below shares a destination with this one, so you can follow Buenos Aires or Chicago 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). 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. 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.