VacationSelector
Lion's Head above Clifton Beach, Cape Town
Cape TownLion's Head above Clifton Beach
The pastel houses of Rainbow Row, Charleston
CharlestonThe pastel houses of Rainbow Row

Photos: Cape Town by Stephan Louis, Pexels License; Charleston by NealVickers, CC BY-SA 4.0, cropped.

Cape Town or Charleston?

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 Cape Town for

  • prices
  • nature and the outdoors
  • nightlife

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

Choose Charleston for

  • beaches
  • getting around
  • shopping

What lies behind each score is written up on Charleston’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. Cape Town 58, Charleston 72: Charleston leads by 14 points.
Food & drink. Cape Town and Charleston are level on 72.
Culture & sights. Cape Town 60, Charleston 64: Charleston leads by 4 points.
Nightlife. Cape Town 60, Charleston 44: Cape Town leads by 16 points.
Nature & outdoors. Cape Town 98, Charleston 55: Cape Town leads by 43 points.
Day trips. Cape Town 68, Charleston 62: Cape Town leads by 6 points.
Good for families. Cape Town 58, Charleston 60: Charleston leads by 2 points.
Getting around. Cape Town 35, Charleston 46: Charleston leads by 11 points.
Shopping & style. Cape Town 50, Charleston 55: Charleston leads by 5 points.
Affordability. Cape Town 72, Charleston 27: Cape Town leads by 45 points.
Live music & performing arts. Cape Town 52, Charleston 42: Cape Town leads by 10 points.
Wellness & relaxation. Cape Town 45, Charleston 40: Cape Town leads by 5 points.
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What lies behind each score is written up on the two cities’ own pages: Cape Town and Charleston.

Your match

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

Cape Town
Best match
61match

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

Charleston
53match

Wins on beaches and getting around with your weighting.

What matters to you?

When should you go?

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

Cape Town in July

18 °Cdaytime high
7 °Cnight-time low
89 mmrain in the month
6 hsunshine a day
15 °Csea
10 hdaylight a day

Charleston in July

33 °Cdaytime high
23 °Cnight-time low
167 mmrain in the month
No recordsunshine a day
28 °Csea
14 hdaylight a day

Daytime high, °C

0°10°20°30°40°JFMAMJJASOND

Rainfall in the month, mm

050100150200JFMAMJJASOND
Cape TownCharleston

Temperature and rainfall are climate normals, averaged over the years shown. Cape Town: 1991-2020 normals, Cape Town Airport (17.5 km from centre). Charleston: 1991-2020 normals, Charleston Airport (16.1 km from centre).

Before you go

MeasureCape TownCharleston
Official languageEnglish, Zulu, Xhosa, Afrikaans, Venda, Northern Sotho, Swazi, Tswana, Tsonga, Sesotho, Southern Ndebele, South African Sign Language-
CurrencyRand (ZAR)US Dollar (USD)
SocketsCMN230 V, 50 HzAB120 V, 60 Hz
Driving sideLeftRight
Time zoneUTC+2UTC-5, UTC-4 in summer
Emergency number112911
Elevation5 m6 m
Main airportCape Town International Airport (CPT)18 km from centre45 non-stop destinationsCharleston International Airport (CHS)16 km from centre56 non-stop destinations
Public holidays this year13 days12 days

By the numbers

MeasureCape TownCharleston
City population3,776,313150,227
People per km²1,538532
Museums within 10 km2219
UNESCO World Heritage sites within 50 km30
Swim season, months above 21 °CNone6 months

Where else could you go?

Every comparison below shares a destination with this one, so you can follow Cape Town or Charleston 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. 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.