VacationSelector
Cardiff Castle, Cardiff
CardiffCardiff Castle
Surfers Paradise from Narrowneck Beach, Gold Coast
Gold CoastSurfers Paradise from Narrowneck Beach

Photos: Cardiff by Tevfik Teker, CC BY 3.0, cropped; Gold Coast by Kgbo, CC BY-SA 4.0, cropped.

Cardiff or Gold Coast?

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

  • culture and sights
  • live music and the arts
  • getting around

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

Choose Gold Coast for

  • beaches
  • families
  • wellness

What lies behind each score is written up on Gold Coast’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, Gold Coast 92: Gold Coast leads by 62 points.
Food & drink. Cardiff 45, Gold Coast 47: Gold Coast leads by 2 points.
Culture & sights. Cardiff 58, Gold Coast 15: Cardiff leads by 43 points.
Nightlife. Cardiff 50, Gold Coast 55: Gold Coast leads by 5 points.
Nature & outdoors. Cardiff 70, Gold Coast 82: Gold Coast leads by 12 points.
Day trips. Cardiff 72, Gold Coast 52: Cardiff leads by 20 points.
Good for families. Cardiff 58, Gold Coast 89: Gold Coast leads by 31 points.
Getting around. Cardiff 66, Gold Coast 45: Cardiff leads by 21 points.
Shopping & style. Cardiff 50, Gold Coast 40: Cardiff leads by 10 points.
Affordability. Cardiff 46, Gold Coast 35: Cardiff leads by 11 points.
Live music & performing arts. Cardiff 57, Gold Coast 30: Cardiff leads by 27 points.
Wellness & relaxation. Cardiff 27, Gold Coast 42: Gold Coast leads by 15 points.
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What lies behind each score is written up on the two cities’ own pages: Cardiff and Gold Coast.

Your match

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

Too close to call, level with your weighting

Cardiff
52match

Wins on culture and sights and live music and the arts with your weighting.

Gold Coast
52match

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.

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

Gold Coast in July

22 °Cdaytime high
12 °Cnight-time low
59 mmrain in the month
8 hsunshine a day
21 °Csea
11 hdaylight a day

Daytime high, °C

0°10°20°30°JFMAMJJASOND

Rainfall in the month, mm

050100150200250JFMAMJJASOND
CardiffGold Coast

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.

Gold Coast's sunshine is measured 75 km from the centre, at Brisbane Airport.

Temperature and rainfall are climate normals, averaged over the years shown. Cardiff: 1991-2020 normals, Cardiff-Wales Airport (14.9 km from centre). Gold Coast: 1991-2020 normals, Gold Coast Seaway (13 km from centre).

Before you go

MeasureCardiffGold Coast
Official languageEnglishEnglish
CurrencyPound Sterling (GBP)Australian Dollar (AUD)
SocketsG230 V, 50 HzI230 V, 50 Hz
Driving sideLeftLeft
Time zoneUTC, UTC+1 in summerUTC+10
Emergency number112 or 999000
Elevation41 m12 m
Main airportCardiff International Airport (CWL)15 km from centre30 non-stop destinationsGold Coast Airport (OOL)20 km from centre19 non-stop destinations
Public holidays this year8 days11 days

By the numbers

MeasureCardiffGold Coast
City population383,536607,665
People per km²2,734433
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 Gold Coast 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.