VacationSelector
Cardiff Castle, Cardiff
CardiffCardiff Castle
The harbour seen from above, Marmaris
MarmarisThe harbour seen from above

Photos: Cardiff by Tevfik Teker, CC BY 3.0, cropped; Marmaris by Mstyslav Chernov, CC BY-SA 3.0, cropped.

Cardiff or Marmaris?

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
  • culture and sights
  • shopping

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

Choose Marmaris for

  • beaches
  • wellness
  • prices

What lies behind each score is written up on Marmaris’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, Marmaris 80: Marmaris leads by 50 points.
Food & drink. Cardiff 45, Marmaris 40: Cardiff leads by 5 points.
Culture & sights. Cardiff 58, Marmaris 18: Cardiff leads by 40 points.
Nightlife. Cardiff 50, Marmaris 60: Marmaris leads by 10 points.
Nature & outdoors. Cardiff 70, Marmaris 72: Marmaris leads by 2 points.
Day trips. Cardiff 72, Marmaris 65: Cardiff leads by 7 points.
Good for families. Cardiff 58, Marmaris 62: Marmaris leads by 4 points.
Getting around. Cardiff 66, Marmaris 55: Cardiff leads by 11 points.
Shopping & style. Cardiff 50, Marmaris 38: Cardiff leads by 12 points.
Affordability. Cardiff 46, Marmaris 62: Marmaris leads by 16 points.
Live music & performing arts. Cardiff 57, Marmaris 12: Cardiff leads by 45 points.
Wellness & relaxation. Cardiff 27, Marmaris 50: Marmaris leads by 23 points.
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What lies behind each score is written up on the two cities’ own pages: Cardiff and Marmaris.

Your match

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

Too close to call, 1 point apart

Cardiff
52match

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

Marmaris
51match

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

Marmaris in July

32 °Cdaytime high
21 °Cnight-time low
8 mmrain in the month
No recordsunshine a day
25 °Csea
14 hdaylight a day

Daytime high, °C

0°10°20°30°40°JFMAMJJASOND

Rainfall in the month, mm

050100150200250JFMAMJJASOND
CardiffMarmaris

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.

Marmaris's temperatures are measured 49 km from the centre, at Dalaman.

Marmaris 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.

Temperature and rainfall are climate normals, averaged over the years shown. Cardiff: 1991-2020 normals, Cardiff-Wales Airport (14.9 km from centre). Marmaris: 2000-2020 (rainfall 1991-2020) normals, Dalaman (48.8 km from centre).

Before you go

MeasureCardiffMarmaris
Official languageEnglishTurkish
CurrencyPound Sterling (GBP)Turkish Lira (TRY)
SocketsG230 V, 50 HzCF230 V, 50 Hz
Driving sideLeftRight
Time zoneUTC, UTC+1 in summerUTC+3
Emergency number112 or 999112
Elevation41 m7 m
Main airportCardiff International Airport (CWL)15 km from centre30 non-stop destinationsDalaman International Airport (DLM)49 km from centre61 non-stop destinations
Public holidays this year8 days14 days

By the numbers

MeasureCardiffMarmaris
City population383,53697,818
People per km²2,734111
Museums within 10 km91
UNESCO World Heritage sites within 50 km11
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 Marmaris 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 2026-11-02. Daily budgets are estimates from country price levels.