VacationSelector
The coastline of the Hotel Zone, Cancun
CancunThe coastline of the Hotel Zone
The Ferris wheel on Santa Monica Pier, Los Angeles
Los AngelesThe Ferris wheel on Santa Monica Pier

Photos: Cancun by Tellez Erik, Pexels License; Los Angeles by Domenico Convertini, CC BY-SA 2.0, cropped.

Cancun or Los Angeles?

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
  • prices
  • day trips

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

Choose Los Angeles for

  • live music and the arts
  • culture and sights
  • food and drink

What lies behind each score is written up on Los Angeles’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, Los Angeles 60: Cancun leads by 38 points.
Food & drink. Cancun 44, Los Angeles 84: Los Angeles leads by 40 points.
Culture & sights. Cancun 15, Los Angeles 66: Los Angeles leads by 51 points.
Nightlife. Cancun 70, Los Angeles 67: Cancun leads by 3 points.
Nature & outdoors. Cancun 66, Los Angeles 80: Los Angeles leads by 14 points.
Day trips. Cancun 65, Los Angeles 60: Cancun leads by 5 points.
Good for families. Cancun 78, Los Angeles 84: Los Angeles leads by 6 points.
Getting around. Cancun and Los Angeles are level on 25.
Shopping & style. Cancun 40, Los Angeles 80: Los Angeles leads by 40 points.
Affordability. Cancun 46, Los Angeles 24: Cancun leads by 22 points.
Live music & performing arts. Cancun 17, Los Angeles 83: Los Angeles leads by 66 points.
Wellness & relaxation. Cancun 55, Los Angeles 60: Los Angeles leads by 5 points.
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What lies behind each score is written up on the two cities’ own pages: Cancun and Los Angeles.

Your match

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

Cancun
52match

Wins on beaches and prices with your weighting.

Los Angeles
Best match
64match

Wins on live music and the arts and culture and sights 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

Los Angeles in July

24 °Cdaytime high
18 °Cnight-time low
1 mmrain in the month
20 °Csea
14 hdaylight a day

Daytime high, °C

0°10°20°30°40°JFMAMJJASOND

Rainfall in the month, mm

050100150200250JFMAMJJASOND
CancunLos Angeles

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. Los Angeles: 1991-2020 normals, Los Angeles Airport (18.5 km from centre).

Before you go

MeasureCancunLos Angeles
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 m106 m
Main airportCancún International Airport (CUN)14 km from centre137 non-stop destinationsLos Angeles International Airport (LAX)19 km from centre177 non-stop destinations
Public holidays this year9 days13 days

By the numbers

MeasureCancunLos Angeles
City population888,7973,898,747
People per km²-2,994
Museums within 10 km139
UNESCO World Heritage sites within 50 km01
Swim season, months above 21 °C12 monthsNone

Where else could you go?

Every comparison below shares a destination with this one, so you can follow Cancun or Los Angeles 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.