VacationSelector
The Esplanade boardwalk and its palms, Cairns
CairnsThe Esplanade boardwalk and its palms
Charles Bridge and the Old Town Bridge Tower, Prague
PragueCharles Bridge and the Old Town Bridge Tower

Photos: Cairns by Donaldytong, Public domain; Prague by Dietmar Rabich, CC BY-SA 4.0, cropped.

Cairns or Prague?

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

  • beaches
  • nature and the outdoors
  • families

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

Choose Prague for

  • culture and sights
  • live music and the arts
  • getting around

What lies behind each score is written up on Prague’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, Prague 10: Cairns leads by 52 points.
Food & drink. Cairns 40, Prague 50: Prague leads by 10 points.
Culture & sights. Cairns 22, Prague 83: Prague leads by 61 points.
Nightlife. Cairns 42, Prague 65: Prague leads by 23 points.
Nature & outdoors. Cairns 95, Prague 58: Cairns leads by 37 points.
Day trips. Cairns 45, Prague 77: Prague leads by 32 points.
Good for families. Cairns 66, Prague 50: Cairns leads by 16 points.
Getting around. Cairns 45, Prague 83: Prague leads by 38 points.
Shopping & style. Cairns 28, Prague 50: Prague leads by 22 points.
Affordability. Cairns 35, Prague 62: Prague leads by 27 points.
Live music & performing arts. Cairns 22, Prague 76: Prague leads by 54 points.
Wellness & relaxation. Cairns 45, Prague 40: Cairns leads by 5 points.
0255075100

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

Your match

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

Cairns
46match

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

Prague
Best match
59match

Wins on culture and sights and live music and the arts 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

Prague in July

25 °Cdaytime high
14 °Cnight-time low
76 mmrain in the month
8 hsunshine a day
No seasea
16 hdaylight a day

Daytime high, °C

0°10°20°30°40°JFMAMJJASOND

Rainfall in the month, mm

0200400600JFMAMJJASOND
CairnsPrague

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). Prague: 1991-2020 normals, Praha-Libus (8.1 km from centre).

Before you go

MeasureCairnsPrague
Official languageEnglishCzech
CurrencyAustralian Dollar (AUD)Czech Koruna (CZK)
SocketsI230 V, 50 HzCE230 V, 50 Hz
Driving sideLeftRight
Time zoneUTC+10UTC+1, UTC+2 in summer
Emergency number000112
Elevation7 m235 m
Main airportCairns International Airport (CNS)6 km from centre32 non-stop destinationsVáclav Havel Airport Prague (PRG)12 km from centre178 non-stop destinations
Public holidays this year11 days13 days

By the numbers

MeasureCairnsPrague
City population146,7781,397,880
People per km²3012,817
Museums within 10 km188
UNESCO World Heritage sites within 50 km11
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 Prague 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.