VacationSelector
The Esplanade boardwalk and its palms, Cairns
CairnsThe Esplanade boardwalk and its palms
The fountain in Piazza De Ferrari, Genoa
GenoaThe fountain in Piazza De Ferrari

Photos: Cairns by Donaldytong, Public domain; Genoa by Faber1893, CC BY-SA 4.0, cropped.

Cairns or Genoa?

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
  • wellness
  • families

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

Choose Genoa for

  • culture and sights
  • day trips
  • food and drink

What lies behind each score is written up on Genoa’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 and Genoa are level on 62.
Food & drink. Cairns 40, Genoa 72: Genoa leads by 32 points.
Culture & sights. Cairns 22, Genoa 76: Genoa leads by 54 points.
Nightlife. Cairns and Genoa are level on 42.
Nature & outdoors. Cairns 95, Genoa 78: Cairns leads by 17 points.
Day trips. Cairns 45, Genoa 83: Genoa leads by 38 points.
Good for families. Cairns 66, Genoa 64: Cairns leads by 2 points.
Getting around. Cairns 45, Genoa 66: Genoa leads by 21 points.
Shopping & style. Cairns 28, Genoa 48: Genoa leads by 20 points.
Affordability. Cairns 35, Genoa 55: Genoa leads by 20 points.
Live music & performing arts. Cairns 22, Genoa 52: Genoa leads by 30 points.
Wellness & relaxation. Cairns 45, Genoa 35: Cairns leads by 10 points.
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What lies behind each score is written up on the two cities’ own pages: Cairns and Genoa.

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 wellness with your weighting.

Genoa
Best match
61match

Wins on culture and sights 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.

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

Genoa in July

27 °Cdaytime high
22 °Cnight-time low
27 mmrain in the month
10 hsunshine a day
24 °Csea
15 hdaylight a day

Daytime high, °C

0°10°20°30°40°JFMAMJJASOND

Rainfall in the month, mm

0200400600JFMAMJJASOND
CairnsGenoa

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.

Genoa 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.

Genoa's sunshine is measured 80 km from the centre, at Capo Mele.

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). Genoa: 1991-2020 normals, Genova / Sestri (6.7 km from centre).

Before you go

MeasureCairnsGenoa
Official languageEnglishItalian
CurrencyAustralian Dollar (AUD)Euro (EUR)
SocketsI230 V, 50 HzCFL230 V, 50 Hz
Driving sideLeftRight
Time zoneUTC+10UTC+1, UTC+2 in summer
Emergency number000112
Elevation7 m20 m
Main airportCairns International Airport (CNS)6 km from centre32 non-stop destinationsGenoa Cristoforo Colombo Airport (GOA)7 km from centre25 non-stop destinations
Public holidays this year11 days13 days

By the numbers

MeasureCairnsGenoa
City population146,778558,745
People per km²3012,325
Museums within 10 km151
UNESCO World Heritage sites within 50 km11
Swim season, months above 21 °C12 months4 months

Where else could you go?

Every comparison below shares a destination with this one, so you can follow Cairns or Genoa 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. Tourism statistics from Eurostat, © European Union, reused under CC BY 4.0. 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.