VacationSelector
Cardiff Castle, Cardiff
CardiffCardiff Castle
The old Hokkaido Government Office and its flower beds, Sapporo
SapporoThe old Hokkaido Government Office and its flower beds

Photos: Cardiff by Tevfik Teker, CC BY 3.0, cropped; Sapporo by Feri88, CC BY 3.0, cropped.

Cardiff or Sapporo?

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

  • culture and sights
  • live music and the arts
  • day trips

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

Choose Sapporo for

  • wellness
  • food and drink
  • nature and the outdoors

What lies behind each score is written up on Sapporo’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, Sapporo 28: Cardiff leads by 2 points.
Food & drink. Cardiff 45, Sapporo 80: Sapporo leads by 35 points.
Culture & sights. Cardiff 58, Sapporo 40: Cardiff leads by 18 points.
Nightlife. Cardiff 50, Sapporo 62: Sapporo leads by 12 points.
Nature & outdoors. Cardiff 70, Sapporo 86: Sapporo leads by 16 points.
Day trips. Cardiff 72, Sapporo 64: Cardiff leads by 8 points.
Good for families. Cardiff 58, Sapporo 72: Sapporo leads by 14 points.
Getting around. Cardiff 66, Sapporo 80: Sapporo leads by 14 points.
Shopping & style. Cardiff 50, Sapporo 58: Sapporo leads by 8 points.
Affordability. Cardiff 46, Sapporo 60: Sapporo leads by 14 points.
Live music & performing arts. Cardiff 57, Sapporo 44: Cardiff leads by 13 points.
Wellness & relaxation. Cardiff 27, Sapporo 80: Sapporo leads by 53 points.
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What lies behind each score is written up on the two cities’ own pages: Cardiff and Sapporo.

Your match

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

Cardiff
52match

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

Sapporo
Best match
63match

Wins on wellness and food and drink 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

Sapporo in July

25 °Cdaytime high
18 °Cnight-time low
91 mmrain in the month
5 hsunshine a day
19 °Csea
15 hdaylight a day

Daytime high, °C

-10°0°10°20°30°JFMAMJJASOND

Rainfall in the month, mm

050100150JFMAMJJASOND
CardiffSapporo

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). Sapporo: 1991-2020 normals, Sapporo (2.2 km from centre).

Before you go

MeasureCardiffSapporo
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 m5 m
Main airportCardiff International Airport (CWL)15 km from centre30 non-stop destinationsNew Chitose Airport (CTS)42 km from centre42 non-stop destinations
Public holidays this year8 days16 days

By the numbers

MeasureCardiffSapporo
City population383,5361,959,313
People per km²2,7341,747
Museums within 10 km933
UNESCO World Heritage sites within 50 km11
Swim season, months above 21 °CNone1 month

Where else could you go?

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