VacationSelector
Lion's Head above Clifton Beach, Cape Town
Cape TownLion's Head above Clifton Beach
The SkyWheel by the beach, Myrtle Beach
Myrtle BeachThe SkyWheel by the beach

Photos: Cape Town by Stephan Louis, Pexels License; Myrtle Beach by The ed17, CC BY-SA 4.0, cropped.

Cape Town or Myrtle Beach?

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

  • nature and the outdoors
  • culture and sights
  • food and drink

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

Choose Myrtle Beach for

  • beaches
  • families

What lies behind each score is written up on Myrtle Beach’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, Myrtle Beach 84: Myrtle Beach leads by 26 points.
Food & drink. Cape Town 72, Myrtle Beach 38: Cape Town leads by 34 points.
Culture & sights. Cape Town 60, Myrtle Beach 20: Cape Town leads by 40 points.
Nightlife. Cape Town 60, Myrtle Beach 42: Cape Town leads by 18 points.
Nature & outdoors. Cape Town 98, Myrtle Beach 46: Cape Town leads by 52 points.
Day trips. Cape Town 68, Myrtle Beach 50: Cape Town leads by 18 points.
Good for families. Cape Town 58, Myrtle Beach 80: Myrtle Beach leads by 22 points.
Getting around. Cape Town 35, Myrtle Beach 18: Cape Town leads by 17 points.
Shopping & style. Cape Town 50, Myrtle Beach 38: Cape Town leads by 12 points.
Affordability. Cape Town 72, Myrtle Beach 52: Cape Town leads by 20 points.
Live music & performing arts. Cape Town 52, Myrtle Beach 30: Cape Town leads by 22 points.
Wellness & relaxation. Cape Town 45, Myrtle Beach 28: Cape Town leads by 17 points.
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What lies behind each score is written up on the two cities’ own pages: Cape Town and Myrtle Beach.

Your match

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

Cape Town
Best match
61match

Wins on nature and the outdoors and culture and sights with your weighting.

Myrtle Beach
44match

Wins on beaches and families 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

Myrtle Beach in July

31 °Cdaytime high
24 °Cnight-time low
172 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 TownMyrtle Beach

Where the figures come from

Myrtle Beach 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. Cape Town: 1991-2020 normals, Cape Town Airport (17.5 km from centre). Myrtle Beach: 1971-2000 (rainfall 1991-2020) normals, Myrtle Beach Air Force Base (5.5 km from centre).

Before you go

MeasureCape TownMyrtle Beach
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 m8 m
Main airportCape Town International Airport (CPT)18 km from centre45 non-stop destinationsMyrtle Beach International Airport (MYR)5 km from centre60 non-stop destinations
Public holidays this year13 days12 days

By the numbers

MeasureCape TownMyrtle Beach
City population3,776,31335,682
People per km²1,538591
Museums within 10 km222
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 Myrtle Beach 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 2026-11-02. Daily budgets are estimates from country price levels.