VacationSelector
Cardiff Castle, Cardiff
CardiffCardiff Castle
Durban

Photos: Cardiff by Tevfik Teker, CC BY 3.0, cropped.

Cardiff or Durban?

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

  • getting around
  • day trips
  • culture and sights

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

Choose Durban for

  • beaches
  • prices
  • food and drink

What lies behind each score is written up on Durban’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, Durban 80: Durban leads by 50 points.
Food & drink. Cardiff 45, Durban 60: Durban leads by 15 points.
Culture & sights. Cardiff 58, Durban 38: Cardiff leads by 20 points.
Nightlife. Cardiff 50, Durban 40: Cardiff leads by 10 points.
Nature & outdoors. Cardiff 70, Durban 68: Cardiff leads by 2 points.
Day trips. Cardiff 72, Durban 38: Cardiff leads by 34 points.
Good for families. Cardiff 58, Durban 60: Durban leads by 2 points.
Getting around. Cardiff 66, Durban 20: Cardiff leads by 46 points.
Shopping & style. Cardiff 50, Durban 42: Cardiff leads by 8 points.
Affordability. Cardiff 46, Durban 72: Durban leads by 26 points.
Live music & performing arts. Cardiff 57, Durban 40: Cardiff leads by 17 points.
Wellness & relaxation. Cardiff 27, Durban 30: Durban leads by 3 points.
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What lies behind each score is written up on the two cities’ own pages: Cardiff and Durban.

Your match

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

Cardiff
Best match
52match

Wins on getting around and day trips with your weighting.

Durban
49match

Wins on beaches and prices 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

Durban in July

23 °Cdaytime high
11 °Cnight-time low
44 mmrain in the month
8 hsunshine a day
22 °Csea
10 hdaylight a day

Daytime high, °C

0°10°20°30°JFMAMJJASOND

Rainfall in the month, mm

050100150JFMAMJJASOND
CardiffDurban

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). Durban: 1991-2020 normals, Durban, Durban International Airport (14.1 km from centre).

Before you go

MeasureCardiffDurban
Official languageEnglishEnglish, Zulu, Xhosa, Afrikaans, Venda, Northern Sotho, Swazi, Tswana, Tsonga, Sesotho, Southern Ndebele, South African Sign Language
CurrencyPound Sterling (GBP)Rand (ZAR)
SocketsG230 V, 50 HzCMN230 V, 50 Hz
Driving sideLeftLeft
Time zoneUTC, UTC+1 in summerUTC+2
Emergency number112 or 999112
Elevation41 m22 m
Main airportCardiff International Airport (CWL)15 km from centre30 non-stop destinationsKing Shaka International Airport (DUR)29 km from centre13 non-stop destinations
Public holidays this year8 days13 days

By the numbers

MeasureCardiffDurban
City population383,536595,061
People per km²2,7342,634
Museums within 10 km91
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 Durban 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.