VacationSelector
Cardiff Castle, Cardiff
CardiffCardiff Castle
Shitennō-ji temple, Osaka
OsakaShitennō-ji temple

Photos: Cardiff by Tevfik Teker, CC BY 3.0, cropped; Osaka by Sarmat Batagov, Pexels License.

Cardiff or Osaka?

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

  • nature and the outdoors

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

Choose Osaka for

  • food and drink
  • wellness
  • nightlife

What lies behind each score is written up on Osaka’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, Osaka 34: Osaka leads by 4 points.
Food & drink. Cardiff 45, Osaka 91: Osaka leads by 46 points.
Culture & sights. Cardiff 58, Osaka 63: Osaka leads by 5 points.
Nightlife. Cardiff 50, Osaka 80: Osaka leads by 30 points.
Nature & outdoors. Cardiff 70, Osaka 58: Cardiff leads by 12 points.
Day trips. Cardiff 72, Osaka 97: Osaka leads by 25 points.
Good for families. Cardiff 58, Osaka 88: Osaka leads by 30 points.
Getting around. Cardiff 66, Osaka 90: Osaka leads by 24 points.
Shopping & style. Cardiff 50, Osaka 80: Osaka leads by 30 points.
Affordability. Cardiff 46, Osaka 60: Osaka leads by 14 points.
Live music & performing arts. Cardiff 57, Osaka 66: Osaka leads by 9 points.
Wellness & relaxation. Cardiff 27, Osaka 66: Osaka leads by 39 points.
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What lies behind each score is written up on the two cities’ own pages: Cardiff and Osaka.

Your match

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

Cardiff
52match

Wins on nature and the outdoors with your weighting.

Osaka
Best match
73match

Wins on food and drink 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

Osaka in July

32 °Cdaytime high
25 °Cnight-time low
175 mmrain in the month
6 hsunshine a day
25 °Csea
14 hdaylight a day

Daytime high, °C

0°10°20°30°40°JFMAMJJASOND

Rainfall in the month, mm

050100150200JFMAMJJASOND
CardiffOsaka

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). Osaka: 1991-2020 normals, Osaka (1.8 km from centre).

Before you go

MeasureCardiffOsaka
Official languageEnglishJapanese
CurrencyPound Sterling (GBP)Yen (JPY)
SocketsG230 V, 50 HzAB100 V, 50 and 60 Hz depending on the region
Driving sideLeftLeft
Time zoneUTC, UTC+1 in summerUTC+9
Emergency number112 or 999Police 110, fire 119
Elevation41 m20 m
Main airportCardiff International Airport (CWL)15 km from centre30 non-stop destinationsKansai International Airport (KIX)38 km from centre62 non-stop destinations
Public holidays this year8 days16 days

By the numbers

MeasureCardiffOsaka
City population383,5362,751,862
People per km²2,73412,340
Museums within 10 km944
UNESCO World Heritage sites within 50 km16
Swim season, months above 21 °CNone5 months

Where else could you go?

Every comparison below shares a destination with this one, so you can follow Cardiff or Osaka 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.