VacationSelector
The Esplanade boardwalk and its palms, Cairns
CairnsThe Esplanade boardwalk and its palms
The Riva in front of Diocletian's Palace, Split
SplitThe Riva in front of Diocletian's Palace

Photos: Cairns by Donaldytong, Public domain; Split by Bernard Gagnon, CC BY-SA 4.0, cropped.

Cairns or Split?

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
  • families
  • wellness

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

Choose Split for

  • culture and sights
  • day trips
  • getting around

What lies behind each score is written up on Split’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, Split 75: Split leads by 13 points.
Food & drink. Cairns 40, Split 57: Split leads by 17 points.
Culture & sights. Cairns 22, Split 66: Split leads by 44 points.
Nightlife. Cairns 42, Split 52: Split leads by 10 points.
Nature & outdoors. Cairns 95, Split 77: Cairns leads by 18 points.
Day trips. Cairns 45, Split 78: Split leads by 33 points.
Good for families. Cairns 66, Split 54: Cairns leads by 12 points.
Getting around. Cairns 45, Split 67: Split leads by 22 points.
Shopping & style. Cairns 28, Split 32: Split leads by 4 points.
Affordability. Cairns 35, Split 45: Split leads by 10 points.
Live music & performing arts. Cairns 22, Split 37: Split leads by 15 points.
Wellness & relaxation. Cairns 45, Split 40: Cairns leads by 5 points.
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What lies behind each score is written up on the two cities’ own pages: Cairns and Split.

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 families with your weighting.

Split
Best match
57match

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

Split in July

31 °Cdaytime high
23 °Cnight-time low
25 mmrain in the month
12 hsunshine a day
24 °Csea
15 hdaylight a day

Daytime high, °C

0°10°20°30°40°JFMAMJJASOND

Rainfall in the month, mm

0200400600JFMAMJJASOND
CairnsSplit

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). Split: 1991-2020 normals, Split / Marjan (0.9 km from centre).

Before you go

MeasureCairnsSplit
Official languageEnglishCroatian
CurrencyAustralian Dollar (AUD)Euro (EUR)
SocketsI230 V, 50 HzCF230 V, 50 Hz
Driving sideLeftRight
Time zoneUTC+10UTC+1, UTC+2 in summer
Emergency number000112
Elevation7 m0 m
Main airportCairns International Airport (CNS)6 km from centre32 non-stop destinationsSplit Saint Jerome Airport (SPU)12 km from centre69 non-stop destinations
Public holidays this year11 days14 days

By the numbers

MeasureCairnsSplit
City population146,778160,577
People per km²301-
Museums within 10 km111
UNESCO World Heritage sites within 50 km14
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 Split 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.