VacationSelector
Cardiff Castle, Cardiff
CardiffCardiff Castle
The Sun and Moon pagodas on Shan Lake, Guilin
GuilinThe Sun and Moon pagodas on Shan Lake

Photos: Cardiff by Tevfik Teker, CC BY 3.0, cropped; Guilin by xiquinhosilva, CC BY 2.0, cropped.

Cardiff or Guilin?

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

  • live music and the arts
  • beaches
  • shopping

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

Choose Guilin for

  • prices
  • nature and the outdoors
  • wellness

What lies behind each score is written up on Guilin’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, Guilin 8: Cardiff leads by 22 points.
Food & drink. Cardiff and Guilin are level on 45.
Culture & sights. Cardiff 58, Guilin 40: Cardiff leads by 18 points.
Nightlife. Cardiff 50, Guilin 30: Cardiff leads by 20 points.
Nature & outdoors. Cardiff 70, Guilin 88: Guilin leads by 18 points.
Day trips. Cardiff 72, Guilin 56: Cardiff leads by 16 points.
Good for families. Cardiff 58, Guilin 45: Cardiff leads by 13 points.
Getting around. Cardiff 66, Guilin 45: Cardiff leads by 21 points.
Shopping & style. Cardiff 50, Guilin 28: Cardiff leads by 22 points.
Affordability. Cardiff 46, Guilin 78: Guilin leads by 32 points.
Live music & performing arts. Cardiff 57, Guilin 30: Cardiff leads by 27 points.
Wellness & relaxation. Cardiff 27, Guilin 40: Guilin leads by 13 points.
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What lies behind each score is written up on the two cities’ own pages: Cardiff and Guilin.

Your match

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

Cardiff
Best match
52match

Wins on live music and the arts and beaches with your weighting.

Guilin
44match

Wins on prices and nature and the outdoors 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

Guilin in July

33 °Cdaytime high
25 °Cnight-time low
248 mmrain in the month
No recordsunshine a day
No seasea
14 hdaylight a day

Daytime high, °C

0°10°20°30°40°JFMAMJJASOND

Rainfall in the month, mm

0100200300400500JFMAMJJASOND
CardiffGuilin

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). Guilin: 1991-2020 normals, Guilin (7.6 km from centre).

Before you go

MeasureCardiffGuilin
Official languageEnglishPutonghua
CurrencyPound Sterling (GBP)Yuan Renminbi (CNY)
SocketsG230 V, 50 HzACI220 V, 50 Hz
Driving sideLeftRight
Time zoneUTC, UTC+1 in summerUTC+8
Emergency number112 or 999Police 110, ambulance 120, fire 119
Elevation41 m153 m
Main airportCardiff International Airport (CWL)15 km from centre30 non-stop destinationsGuilin Liangjiang International Airport (KWL)25 km from centre43 non-stop destinations
Public holidays this year8 days6 days

By the numbers

MeasureCardiffGuilin
City population383,5364,931,137
People per km²2,734-
Museums within 10 km91
UNESCO World Heritage sites within 50 km11
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 Guilin 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.