VacationSelector
The Esplanade boardwalk and its palms, Cairns
CairnsThe Esplanade boardwalk and its palms
India Gate behind its flower beds, Delhi
DelhiIndia Gate behind its flower beds

Photos: Cairns by Donaldytong, Public domain; Delhi by shalender kumar, Pexels License.

Cairns or Delhi?

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 Cairns for

  • nature and the outdoors
  • beaches
  • families

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

Choose Delhi for

  • culture and sights
  • prices
  • shopping

What lies behind each score is written up on Delhi’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. Cairns 62, Delhi 4: Cairns leads by 58 points.
Food & drink. Cairns 40, Delhi 84: Delhi leads by 44 points.
Culture & sights. Cairns 22, Delhi 85: Delhi leads by 63 points.
Nightlife. Cairns 42, Delhi 44: Delhi leads by 2 points.
Nature & outdoors. Cairns 95, Delhi 20: Cairns leads by 75 points.
Day trips. Cairns 45, Delhi 68: Delhi leads by 23 points.
Good for families. Cairns 66, Delhi 32: Cairns leads by 34 points.
Getting around. Cairns 45, Delhi 55: Delhi leads by 10 points.
Shopping & style. Cairns 28, Delhi 78: Delhi leads by 50 points.
Affordability. Cairns 35, Delhi 90: Delhi leads by 55 points.
Live music & performing arts. Cairns 22, Delhi 55: Delhi leads by 33 points.
Wellness & relaxation. Cairns 45, Delhi 25: Cairns leads by 20 points.
0255075100

What lies behind each score is written up on the two cities’ own pages: Cairns and Delhi.

Your match

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

Cairns
46match

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

Delhi
Best match
53match

Wins on culture and sights 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.

Cairns in July

24 °Cdaytime high
20 °Cnight-time low
30 mmrain in the month
No recordsunshine a day
24 °Csea
11 hdaylight a day

Delhi in July

36 °Cdaytime high
28 °Cnight-time low
190 mmrain in the month
4 hsunshine a day
No seasea
14 hdaylight a day

Daytime high, °C

0°10°20°30°40°JFMAMJJASOND

Rainfall in the month, mm

0200400600JFMAMJJASOND
CairnsDelhi

Where the figures come from

Cairns's temperatures are measured 27 km from the centre, at Green Island Aws.

Cairns 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.

Temperature and rainfall are climate normals, averaged over the years shown. Cairns: 1993-2010 (rainfall 1991-2020) normals, Green Island Aws (27 km from centre). Delhi: 1991-2020 normals, New Delhi / Safdarjung (9.4 km from centre).

Before you go

MeasureCairnsDelhi
Official languageEnglishHindi, English
CurrencyAustralian Dollar (AUD)Indian Rupee (INR)
SocketsI230 V, 50 HzCM230 V, 50 Hz
Driving sideLeftLeft
Time zoneUTC+10UTC+5:30
Emergency number000108 or 112
Elevation7 m221 m
Main airportCairns International Airport (CNS)6 km from centre32 non-stop destinationsIndira Gandhi International Airport (DEL)17 km from centre144 non-stop destinations
Public holidays this year11 days-

By the numbers

MeasureCairnsDelhi
City population146,77826,495,000
People per km²30118,962
Museums within 10 km123
UNESCO World Heritage sites within 50 km14
Swim season, months above 21 °C12 months-

Where else could you go?

Every comparison below shares a destination with this one, so you can follow Cairns or Delhi 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 2026-11-01. Daily budgets are estimates from country price levels.