VacationSelector
The coastline of the Hotel Zone, Cancun
CancunThe coastline of the Hotel Zone
The Welcome to Fabulous Las Vegas sign, Las Vegas
Las VegasThe Welcome to Fabulous Las Vegas sign

Photos: Cancun by Tellez Erik, Pexels License; Las Vegas by Christian David, CC BY-SA 4.0, cropped.

Cancun or Las Vegas?

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 Cancun for

  • beaches
  • families
  • day trips

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

Choose Las Vegas for

  • live music and the arts
  • food and drink
  • shopping

What lies behind each score is written up on Las Vegas’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. Cancun 98, Las Vegas 10: Cancun leads by 88 points.
Food & drink. Cancun 44, Las Vegas 68: Las Vegas leads by 24 points.
Culture & sights. Cancun 15, Las Vegas 25: Las Vegas leads by 10 points.
Nightlife. Cancun 70, Las Vegas 88: Las Vegas leads by 18 points.
Nature & outdoors. Cancun 66, Las Vegas 68: Las Vegas leads by 2 points.
Day trips. Cancun 65, Las Vegas 25: Cancun leads by 40 points.
Good for families. Cancun 78, Las Vegas 25: Cancun leads by 53 points.
Getting around. Cancun 25, Las Vegas 38: Las Vegas leads by 13 points.
Shopping & style. Cancun 40, Las Vegas 64: Las Vegas leads by 24 points.
Affordability. Cancun 46, Las Vegas 35: Cancun leads by 11 points.
Live music & performing arts. Cancun 17, Las Vegas 78: Las Vegas leads by 61 points.
Wellness & relaxation. Cancun 55, Las Vegas 40: Cancun leads by 15 points.
0255075100

What lies behind each score is written up on the two cities’ own pages: Cancun and Las Vegas.

Your match

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

Cancun
Best match
52match

Wins on beaches and families with your weighting.

Las Vegas
47match

Wins on live music and the arts and food and drink with your weighting.

What matters to you?

When should you go?

Pick your month. The climate figures are measured averages, not a forecast.

Cancun in July

30 °Cdaytime high
26 °Cnight-time low
89 mmrain in the month
29 °Csea
13 hdaylight a day

Las Vegas in July

40 °Cdaytime high
27 °Cnight-time low
9 mmrain in the month
No seasea
14 hdaylight a day

Daytime high, °C

0°10°20°30°40°50°JFMAMJJASOND

Rainfall in the month, mm

050100150200250JFMAMJJASOND
CancunLas Vegas

Where the figures come from

Cancun has no weather station within reach, so its figures come from a gridded climate model rather than a measured record, and read a broad area rather than the city itself.

Temperature and rainfall are climate normals, averaged over the years shown. Cancun: 2001-2020 normals, NASA POWER reanalysis grid, no weather station within 90 km. Las Vegas: 1991-2020 normals, McCarran International Airport (8.5 km from centre).

Before you go

MeasureCancunLas Vegas
Official languageSpanish, Nahuatl, Yucatec Maya-
CurrencyMexican Peso (MXN)US Dollar (USD)
SocketsAB127 V, 60 HzAB120 V, 60 Hz
Driving sideRightRight
Time zoneUTC-5UTC-8, UTC-7 in summer
Emergency number911911
Elevation5 m610 m
Main airportCancún International Airport (CUN)14 km from centre137 non-stop destinationsHarry Reid International Airport (LAS)4 km from centre159 non-stop destinations
Public holidays this year9 days11 days

By the numbers

MeasureCancunLas Vegas
City population888,797641,903
People per km²-1,843
Museums within 10 km121
UNESCO World Heritage sites within 50 km00
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 Cancun or Las Vegas somewhere new.

Browse every destination

Sources

Structured data from Wikidata (CC0). Temperature and rainfall for destinations with no weather station are from the NASA POWER 2001-2020 climatology, derived from MERRA-2. 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. Weather data by Meteostat. Meteorological data provided by NOAA, DWD and others. 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 2026-10-31. Daily budgets are estimates from country price levels.