VacationSelector
Cardiff Castle, Cardiff
CardiffCardiff Castle
Florence and the Arno, Florence
FlorenceFlorence and the Arno

Photos: Cardiff by Tevfik Teker, CC BY 3.0, cropped; Florence by Wolfgang Weiser, Pexels License.

Cardiff or Florence?

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

  • beaches
  • families
  • nature and the outdoors

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

Choose Florence for

  • culture and sights
  • food and drink
  • day trips

What lies behind each score is written up on Florence’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, Florence 14: Cardiff leads by 16 points.
Food & drink. Cardiff 45, Florence 74: Florence leads by 29 points.
Culture & sights. Cardiff 58, Florence 94: Florence leads by 36 points.
Nightlife. Cardiff 50, Florence 42: Cardiff leads by 8 points.
Nature & outdoors. Cardiff 70, Florence 58: Cardiff leads by 12 points.
Day trips. Cardiff 72, Florence 98: Florence leads by 26 points.
Good for families. Cardiff 58, Florence 45: Cardiff leads by 13 points.
Getting around. Cardiff 66, Florence 78: Florence leads by 12 points.
Shopping & style. Cardiff 50, Florence 72: Florence leads by 22 points.
Affordability. Cardiff 46, Florence 35: Cardiff leads by 11 points.
Live music & performing arts. Cardiff 57, Florence 58: Florence leads by 1 points.
Wellness & relaxation. Cardiff 27, Florence 42: Florence leads by 15 points.
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What lies behind each score is written up on the two cities’ own pages: Cardiff and Florence.

Your match

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

Cardiff
52match

Wins on beaches and families with your weighting.

Florence
Best match
59match

Wins on culture and sights and food and drink 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

Florence in July

32 °Cdaytime high
19 °Cnight-time low
37 mmrain in the month
11 hsunshine a day
No seasea
15 hdaylight a day

Daytime high, °C

0°10°20°30°40°JFMAMJJASOND

Rainfall in the month, mm

050100150JFMAMJJASOND
CardiffFlorence

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.

Florence 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.

Florence's sunshine is measured 71 km from the centre, at Pisa / S. Giusto.

Temperature and rainfall are climate normals, averaged over the years shown. Cardiff: 1991-2020 normals, Cardiff-Wales Airport (14.9 km from centre). Florence: 1995-2020 (sunshine 1991-2020, rainfall 1991-2020) normals, Firenze / Peretola (5.6 km from centre).

Before you go

MeasureCardiffFlorence
Official languageEnglishItalian
CurrencyPound Sterling (GBP)Euro (EUR)
SocketsG230 V, 50 HzCFL230 V, 50 Hz
Driving sideLeftRight
Time zoneUTC, UTC+1 in summerUTC+1, UTC+2 in summer
Emergency number112 or 999112
Elevation41 m50 m
Main airportCardiff International Airport (CWL)15 km from centre30 non-stop destinationsFlorence Airport, Peretola (FLR)6 km from centre46 non-stop destinations
Public holidays this year8 days13 days

By the numbers

MeasureCardiffFlorence
City population383,536360,930
People per km²2,7343,528
Museums within 10 km9141
UNESCO World Heritage sites within 50 km14
Swim season, months above 21 °CNone-

Where else could you go?

Every comparison below shares a destination with this one, so you can follow Cardiff or Florence 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. Tourism statistics from Eurostat, © European Union, reused under CC BY 4.0. 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.