VacationSelector
Lion's Head above Clifton Beach, Cape Town
Cape TownLion's Head above Clifton Beach
A painted funicular on the hillside, Valparaiso
ValparaisoA painted funicular on the hillside

Photos: Cape Town by Stephan Louis, Pexels License; Valparaiso by Maclemo, CC BY-SA 3.0, cropped.

Cape Town or Valparaiso?

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
  • wellness
  • families

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

Choose Valparaiso for

  • getting around
  • culture and sights

What lies behind each score is written up on Valparaiso’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, Valparaiso 36: Cape Town leads by 22 points.
Food & drink. Cape Town 72, Valparaiso 50: Cape Town leads by 22 points.
Culture & sights. Cape Town 60, Valparaiso 62: Valparaiso leads by 2 points.
Nightlife. Cape Town 60, Valparaiso 56: Cape Town leads by 4 points.
Nature & outdoors. Cape Town 98, Valparaiso 60: Cape Town leads by 38 points.
Day trips. Cape Town 68, Valparaiso 63: Cape Town leads by 5 points.
Good for families. Cape Town 58, Valparaiso 33: Cape Town leads by 25 points.
Getting around. Cape Town 35, Valparaiso 44: Valparaiso leads by 9 points.
Shopping & style. Cape Town 50, Valparaiso 30: Cape Town leads by 20 points.
Affordability. Cape Town 72, Valparaiso 60: Cape Town leads by 12 points.
Live music & performing arts. Cape Town 52, Valparaiso 38: Cape Town leads by 14 points.
Wellness & relaxation. Cape Town 45, Valparaiso 18: Cape Town leads by 27 points.
0255075100

What lies behind each score is written up on the two cities’ own pages: Cape Town and Valparaiso.

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 wellness with your weighting.

Valparaiso
46match

Wins on getting around 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.

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

Valparaiso in July

15 °Cdaytime high
7 °Cnight-time low
71 mmrain in the month
No recordsunshine a day
13 °Csea
10 hdaylight a day

Daytime high, °C

0°10°20°30°JFMAMJJASOND

Rainfall in the month, mm

0255075100125JFMAMJJASOND
Cape TownValparaiso

Where the figures come from

Valparaiso 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). Valparaiso: 2010-2025 (rainfall 1991-2020) normals, Viña Del Mar / Montemar (17 km from centre).

Before you go

MeasureCape TownValparaiso
Official languageEnglish, Zulu, Xhosa, Afrikaans, Venda, Northern Sotho, Swazi, Tswana, Tsonga, Sesotho, Southern Ndebele, South African Sign LanguageSpanish
CurrencyRand (ZAR)Chilean Peso (CLP)
SocketsCMN230 V, 50 HzCL220 V, 50 Hz
Driving sideLeftRight
Time zoneUTC+2UTC-4, UTC-3 in summer
Emergency number112Police 133/134, ambulance 131, fire 132
Elevation5 m21 m
Main airportCape Town International Airport (CPT)18 km from centre45 non-stop destinationsComodoro Arturo Merino Benítez International Airport (SCL)87 km from centre67 non-stop destinations
Public holidays this year13 days16 days

By the numbers

MeasureCape TownValparaiso
City population3,776,313296,655
People per km²1,5386,180
Museums within 10 km2217
UNESCO World Heritage sites within 50 km31
Swim season, months above 21 °CNoneNone

Where else could you go?

Every comparison below shares a destination with this one, so you can follow Cape Town or Valparaiso 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 2026-11-01. Daily budgets are estimates from country price levels.