Cadiz or Valencia?
Two destinations compared on nine measures of openly sourced data. Weight what matters to you and the verdict follows.
Your match
Wins on good for families and beaches & swimming with your weighting.
Wins on nightlife and places to eat with your weighting.
What matters to you?
Pick a travel style or drag the sliders. The match scores above update as you do.
The verdict
Choose Cadiz if you want the sea at the end of the street, a compact seaside town with the beach choice and the child-friendly attractions clustered near the centre.
Choose Valencia if you want a city: many times as many restaurants and bars near the centre, about three times as many museums, and more protected countryside within day-trip reach.
Scoreboard
Each measure scored 0 to 100. Open a row for the figures behind the score.
Beaches & swimming. Cadiz leads by 3 points.3
| Cadiz | Valencia | |
|---|---|---|
| Score | 70 | 67 |
| Swim season months | 3 | 5 |
| Beaches 10 km | 29 | 12 |
| Coast distance | 0 km | 3 km |
| Water distance | 0 km | 3 km |
Places to eat. Valencia leads by 34 points.34
| Cadiz | Valencia | |
|---|---|---|
| Score | 44 | 78 |
| Restaurants within 2 km of centre | 338 | 1,995 |
| Effective number of cuisines within 2 km | 18 | 33 |
Museums & heritage. Valencia leads by 19 points.19
| Cadiz | Valencia | |
|---|---|---|
| Score | 36 | 55 |
| Museums within 10 km | 23 | 59 |
| Museums within 2 km of centre | 16 | 26 |
| Share of museums within 2 km % | 70 | 44 |
| Unesco sites within 50 km | 0 | 2 |
Nightlife. Valencia leads by 40 points.40
| Cadiz | Valencia | |
|---|---|---|
| Score | 30 | 70 |
| Drinking venues within 4 km | 241 | 1,513 |
| Drinking venues within 2 km of centre | 175 | 957 |
| Share of drinking venues within 2 km % | 73 | 63 |
| Nightclubs within 4 km | 6 | 108 |
Nature & day trips. Valencia leads by 27 points.27
| Cadiz | Valencia | |
|---|---|---|
| Score | 26 | 53 |
| Protected land share 50 km % | 4 | 10 |
| Landscape blanket share 50 km % | 0 | 0 |
| Land share of disc % | 45 | 64 |
| Park area within 2 km | 24 hectares | 119 hectares |
Good for families. Cadiz leads by 12 points.12
| Cadiz | Valencia | |
|---|---|---|
| Score | 54 | 42 |
| Tourist attractions within 2 km | 80 | 12 |
| Park area within 2 km | 24 hectares | 119 hectares |
| Theme parks within 30 km | 0 | 0 |
Sights concentration. Valencia leads by 21 points.21
| Cadiz | Valencia | |
|---|---|---|
| Score | 31 | 52 |
| Notable places within 2 km | 23 | 78 |
| Min wikipedia languages | 5 | 5 |
Value for money. Cadiz and Valencia are level on 71.
| Cadiz | Valencia | |
|---|---|---|
| Score | 71 | 71 |
| Price level global | 60.8 | 60.8 |
| Daily budget | €122 | €122 |
Year-round weather. Valencia leads by 1 points.1
| Cadiz | Valencia | |
|---|---|---|
| Score | 83 | 84 |
| Monthly daytime high | 16.2 °C to 28 °C | 16.8 °C to 30.6 °C |
| Monthly rainfall | 0 mm to 89 mm | 7 mm to 70 mm |
| Dry months | 5 | 8 |
Where they differ
Cadiz puts the water at the centre: the sea is 0km from town against 3km in Valencia, and there are 29 beaches nearby against 12. It also has many more tourist attractions close to the centre, which is what makes it the easier city with children.
Valencia has many times as many restaurants near the centre and a far wider range of kitchens, plus many times as many bars and clubs. For days out, 10% of the land around it is protected against 4% around Cadiz, and 2 UNESCO-listed places lie within reach.
Where they are alike
Weather is where the two are hardest to separate. Both stay mild in January, with highs of 16-17°C, and both peak in August; Valencia runs slightly warmer through the year, Cadiz slightly sunnier.
Both are swimming towns with warm late-summer seas, 23°C in Cadiz and 26°C in Valencia, and neither has a theme park within reach, so time with children means beaches, parks and local attractions in either.
Which traveller are you?
Families with young children are better served in Cadiz, where the tourist attractions sit close together near the centre and the beach is a walk rather than a journey. Neither city has a theme park within reach.
Anyone travelling to eat and go out should pick Valencia: many times as many restaurants and bars near the centre, a wider range of kitchens, more museums, and more notable places within walking distance.
Swimmers can go either way. Cadiz has 29 beaches against 12 and sand at the end of the street; Valencia's water stays at 21°C or more for 5 months against Cadiz's 3.
What the numbers don't tell you
The value comparison between these two carries no information: that axis is a national price level, identical for both by construction, and the €122 daily budget beside it is one estimate for the country rather than a measurement of either city. Nothing here tells you which costs less on the ground.
A beach count is supply, not comfort. Cadiz has more beaches and the sea at the door, but the water is at 21°C or more for only 3 months, and its strongest months are exactly the ones everyone else travels in. Valencia's warm-sea season runs longer, though its rain returns in autumn.
When should you go?
The figures behind each month. Each row is shaded against that destination's own year, so the deepest cell is its best month for that measure and the palest its weakest. Shades are not comparable between the two rows.
Temperature and rainfall are thirty-year climate normals, averaged over the years shown. Cadiz: 1991-2020 normals, Cadiz Bay / Puntales (5.2 km from centre). Valencia: 1991-2020 normals, Valencia (1.6 km from centre).
Cadiz is at its best from June to September: highs of 26-28°C, sea at 23°C and high summer all but dry at 0-2mm. The autumn turn is sharp, with 76-89mm falling across October and November.
Valencia spreads further either side of summer, with highs of 24-28°C already in May and June and water still warm well into autumn. Peak heat is stronger, at 31°C, and September is its wettest month at 70mm, so early summer is the safer bet.
Getting there
| Flying from | Cadiz | Valencia |
|---|---|---|
| ParisCDG, ORY, BVA | 2 h 35 m €83-157 TNG · 95 km | 1 h 55 m €103-131 VLC · 9 km |
| BilbaoBIO | 1 h 30 m €112-119 SVQ · 105 km | 1 h 15 m €63-116 1 stop VLC · 9 km |
| PalmaPMI | 1 h 40 m no fares XRY · 31 km | 1 h 0 m €32-53 VLC · 9 km |
| MilanMXP, BGY, LIN | 2 h 25 m €89-105 SVQ · 105 km | 1 h 50 m €51-87 VLC · 9 km |
| MadridMAD | 1 h 15 m no fares XRY · 31 km | 1 h 0 m €69-81 VLC · 9 km |
| Santiago De CompostelaSCQ | 1 h 25 m no fares SVQ · 105 km | 1 h 35 m no fares VLC · 9 km |
| LondonLHR, LGW, STN, LTN +2 | 2 h 40 m no fares XRY · 31 km | 2 h 15 m €80-167 VLC · 9 km |
| AmsterdamAMS | 3 h 5 m no fares TNG · 95 km | 2 h 25 m €155-178 VLC · 9 km |
| IbizaIBZ | 1 h 25 m €87-133 1 stop SVQ · 105 km | 50 m no fares VLC · 9 km |
| MarrakechRAK | 1 h 30 m no fares SVQ · 105 km | 2 h 0 m €72-115 VLC · 9 km |
The busiest departure cities for these two, with a place kept for each other part of the world. Busiest means arriving passengers where an official count exists, and where none does, the number of non-stop services flown: official route statistics are published by the European reporting countries and by nobody else, so a table ranked on them alone would offer a reader in New York or Tokyo ten European cities. Flying times are estimated from the distance between airports, and every row is a city flown non-stop to both. Where the typical offer connects anyway, the stops are shown. Under each figure is the airport the flight lands at and how far that is from the centre, because the nearest airport is not always the one a route is flown to. Where both columns name the same airport it is one flight, and the difference between the two is the distance printed beside it. Typical return fares for 2026-08 to 2026-10, cached market data up to 7 days old. The figure is the middle half of the offers found, so a single price means they agreed and a range means they did not; for a typical route that middle half spans about a quarter of the median, and for the least settled routes rather more than the median itself.
Before you go
| Measure | Cadiz | Valencia |
|---|---|---|
| Official language | Spanish | Spanish |
| Currency | Euro (EUR) | Euro (EUR) |
| Sockets | CF230 V, 50 Hz | CF230 V, 50 Hz |
| Driving side | Right | Right |
| Time zone | UTC+1, UTC+2 in summer | UTC+1, UTC+2 in summer |
| Emergency number | 112 | 112 |
| Elevation | 11 m | 15 m |
| Main airport | Jerez Airport (XRY)31 km from centre23 non-stop destinations | Valencia Airport (VLC)9 km from centre107 non-stop destinations |
| Public holidays this year | 12 days | 13 days |
By the numbers
| Measure | Cadiz | Valencia |
|---|---|---|
| City population | 109,950 | 840,792 |
| People per km² | 9,087 | 6,242 |
| Museums within 10 km | 11 | 46 |
| UNESCO World Heritage sites within 50 km | 0 | 2 |
| Distinct cuisines in the centre | 28 | 92 |
| Swim season, months above 21 °C | 3 months | 5 months |
Where else could you go?
Every comparison below shares a destination with this one, so you can follow Cadiz or Valencia somewhere new.