VacationSelector
Cardiff Castle, Cardiff
CardiffCardiff Castle
The Treasury, Al-Khazneh, cut into the rock, Petra
PetraThe Treasury, Al-Khazneh, cut into the rock

Photos: Cardiff by Tevfik Teker, CC BY 3.0, cropped; Petra by Yasir Gürbüz, Pexels License.

Cardiff or Petra?

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
  • nightlife
  • day trips

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

Choose Petra for

  • culture and sights
  • nature and the outdoors
  • wellness

What lies behind each score is written up on Petra’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, Petra 5: Cardiff leads by 25 points.
Food & drink. Cardiff 45, Petra 22: Cardiff leads by 23 points.
Culture & sights. Cardiff 58, Petra 85: Petra leads by 27 points.
Nightlife. Cardiff 50, Petra 5: Cardiff leads by 45 points.
Nature & outdoors. Cardiff 70, Petra 78: Petra leads by 8 points.
Day trips. Cardiff 72, Petra 30: Cardiff leads by 42 points.
Good for families. Cardiff 58, Petra 25: Cardiff leads by 33 points.
Getting around. Cardiff 66, Petra 25: Cardiff leads by 41 points.
Shopping & style. Cardiff 50, Petra 18: Cardiff leads by 32 points.
Affordability. Cardiff 46, Petra 45: Cardiff leads by 1 points.
Live music & performing arts. Cardiff 57, Petra 10: Cardiff leads by 47 points.
Wellness & relaxation. Cardiff 27, Petra 28: Petra leads by 1 points.
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What lies behind each score is written up on the two cities’ own pages: Cardiff and Petra.

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 nightlife with your weighting.

Petra
31match

Wins on culture and sights 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

Petra in July

35 °Cdaytime high
19 °Cnight-time low
0 mmrain in the month
12 hsunshine a day
No seasea
14 hdaylight a day

Daytime high, °C

0°10°20°30°40°JFMAMJJASOND

Rainfall in the month, mm

050100150JFMAMJJASOND
CardiffPetra

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.

Petra's temperatures are measured 34 km from the centre, at Ma'An.

Petra's station stands 219 m above the city centre, so the centre is likely a little warmer than the figures say.

Petra 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). Petra: 1991-2020 normals, Ma'An (33.9 km from centre).

Before you go

MeasureCardiffPetra
Official languageEnglishArabic
CurrencyPound Sterling (GBP)Jordanian Dinar (JOD)
SocketsG230 V, 50 HzBCFGJ230 V, 50 Hz
Driving sideLeftRight
Time zoneUTC, UTC+1 in summerUTC+3
Emergency number112 or 999911
Elevation41 m850 m
Main airportCardiff International Airport (CWL)15 km from centre30 non-stop destinationsKing Hussein International Airport (AQJ)90 km from centre5 non-stop destinations
Public holidays this year8 days-

By the numbers

MeasureCardiffPetra
City population383,536-
People per km²2,734-
Museums within 10 km92
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 Petra 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.