VacationSelector
Cardiff Castle, Cardiff
CardiffCardiff Castle
Yellow colonial houses in the walled city, Cartagena
CartagenaYellow colonial houses in the walled city

Photos: Cardiff by Tevfik Teker, CC BY 3.0, cropped; Cartagena by Dr. Thomas Liptak, CC BY-SA 4.0, cropped.

Cardiff or Cartagena?

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 Cardiff for

  • day trips
  • nature and the outdoors
  • families

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

Choose Cartagena for

  • beaches
  • nightlife
  • food and drink

What lies behind each score is written up on Cartagena’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. Cardiff 30, Cartagena 70: Cartagena leads by 40 points.
Food & drink. Cardiff 45, Cartagena 62: Cartagena leads by 17 points.
Culture & sights. Cardiff 58, Cartagena 68: Cartagena leads by 10 points.
Nightlife. Cardiff 50, Cartagena 70: Cartagena leads by 20 points.
Nature & outdoors. Cardiff 70, Cartagena 46: Cardiff leads by 24 points.
Day trips. Cardiff 72, Cartagena 33: Cardiff leads by 39 points.
Good for families. Cardiff 58, Cartagena 40: Cardiff leads by 18 points.
Getting around. Cardiff 66, Cartagena 54: Cardiff leads by 12 points.
Shopping & style. Cardiff 50, Cartagena 48: Cardiff leads by 2 points.
Affordability. Cardiff 46, Cartagena 60: Cartagena leads by 14 points.
Live music & performing arts. Cardiff 57, Cartagena 40: Cardiff leads by 17 points.
Wellness & relaxation. Cardiff 27, Cartagena 40: Cartagena leads by 13 points.
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What lies behind each score is written up on the two cities’ own pages: Cardiff and Cartagena.

Your match

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

Too close to call, 1 point apart

Cardiff
52match

Wins on day trips and nature and the outdoors with your weighting.

Cartagena
53match

Wins on beaches and nightlife with your weighting.

What matters to you?

When should you go?

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

Cardiff in July

20 °Cdaytime high
13 °Cnight-time low
83 mmrain in the month
7 hsunshine a day
17 °Csea
16 hdaylight a day

Cartagena in July

31 °Cdaytime high
26 °Cnight-time low
124 mmrain in the month
7 hsunshine a day
30 °Csea
13 hdaylight a day

Daytime high, °C

0°10°20°30°40°JFMAMJJASOND

Rainfall in the month, mm

050100150200250JFMAMJJASOND
CardiffCartagena

Where the figures come from

Cardiff 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.

Cardiff's sunshine is measured 83 km from the centre, at Lyneham.

Temperature and rainfall are climate normals, averaged over the years shown. Cardiff: 1991-2020 normals, Cardiff-Wales Airport (14.9 km from centre). Cartagena: 1991-2020 normals, Cartagena / Rafael Nunez (3.1 km from centre).

Before you go

MeasureCardiffCartagena
Official languageEnglishSpanish
CurrencyPound Sterling (GBP)Colombian Peso (COP)
SocketsG230 V, 50 HzAB110 V, 60 Hz
Driving sideLeftRight
Time zoneUTC, UTC+1 in summerUTC-5
Emergency number112 or 999123
Elevation41 m2 m
Main airportCardiff International Airport (CWL)15 km from centre30 non-stop destinationsRafael Nuñez International Airport (CTG)2 km from centre26 non-stop destinations
Public holidays this year8 days19 days

By the numbers

MeasureCardiffCartagena
City population383,536914,552
People per km²2,7341,599
Museums within 10 km92
UNESCO World Heritage sites within 50 km11
Swim season, months above 21 °CNone12 months

Where else could you go?

Every comparison below shares a destination with this one, so you can follow Cardiff or Cartagena 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.