VacationSelector
Cardiff Castle, Cardiff
CardiffCardiff Castle
Bougainvillea and the dome of Agia Napa Cathedral, Limassol
LimassolBougainvillea and the dome of Agia Napa Cathedral

Photos: Cardiff by Tevfik Teker, CC BY 3.0, cropped; Limassol by Julian Lupyan, CC0.

Cardiff or Limassol?

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
  • live music and the arts
  • culture and sights

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

Choose Limassol for

  • beaches
  • wellness
  • food and drink

What lies behind each score is written up on Limassol’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, Limassol 77: Limassol leads by 47 points.
Food & drink. Cardiff 45, Limassol 58: Limassol leads by 13 points.
Culture & sights. Cardiff 58, Limassol 38: Cardiff leads by 20 points.
Nightlife. Cardiff and Limassol are level on 50.
Nature & outdoors. Cardiff 70, Limassol 65: Cardiff leads by 5 points.
Day trips. Cardiff 72, Limassol 76: Limassol leads by 4 points.
Good for families. Cardiff 58, Limassol 63: Limassol leads by 5 points.
Getting around. Cardiff 66, Limassol 38: Cardiff leads by 28 points.
Shopping & style. Cardiff 50, Limassol 42: Cardiff leads by 8 points.
Affordability. Cardiff 46, Limassol 44: Cardiff leads by 2 points.
Live music & performing arts. Cardiff 57, Limassol 32: Cardiff leads by 25 points.
Wellness & relaxation. Cardiff 27, Limassol 42: Limassol leads by 15 points.
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What lies behind each score is written up on the two cities’ own pages: Cardiff and Limassol.

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 getting around and live music and the arts with your weighting.

Limassol
52match

Wins on beaches and wellness 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

Limassol in July

31 °Cdaytime high
24 °Cnight-time low
1 mmrain in the month
13 hsunshine a day
26 °Csea
14 hdaylight a day

Daytime high, °C

0°10°20°30°40°JFMAMJJASOND

Rainfall in the month, mm

050100150JFMAMJJASOND
CardiffLimassol

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.

Limassol 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.

Limassol's sunshine is measured 59 km from the centre, at Larnaca Airport.

Temperature and rainfall are climate normals, averaged over the years shown. Cardiff: 1991-2020 normals, Cardiff-Wales Airport (14.9 km from centre). Limassol: 1998-2020 (sunshine 1991-2020, rainfall 1991-2020) normals, Akrotiri (11.6 km from centre).

Before you go

MeasureCardiffLimassol
Official languageEnglishTurkish, Greek, Modern Greek
CurrencyPound Sterling (GBP)Euro (EUR)
SocketsG230 V, 50 HzG240 V, 50 Hz
Driving sideLeftLeft
Time zoneUTC, UTC+1 in summerUTC+2, UTC+3 in summer
Emergency number112 or 999112
Elevation41 m10 m
Main airportCardiff International Airport (CWL)15 km from centre30 non-stop destinationsLarnaca International Airport (LCA)58 km from centre112 non-stop destinations
Public holidays this year8 days17 days

By the numbers

MeasureCardiffLimassol
City population383,536107,970
People per km²2,7342,405
Museums within 10 km92
UNESCO World Heritage sites within 50 km13
Swim season, months above 21 °CNone6 months

Where else could you go?

Every comparison below shares a destination with this one, so you can follow Cardiff or Limassol 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. Ground elevations sampled from the Mapzen terrain tiles via OpenTopoData, merging SRTM, ASTER, NED, EU-DEM and national sources. 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.