VacationSelector
Cardiff Castle, Cardiff
CardiffCardiff Castle
The Great Mosque with the mountains behind, Tirana
TiranaThe Great Mosque with the mountains behind

Photos: Cardiff by Tevfik Teker, CC BY 3.0, cropped; Tirana by Bjørn Christian Tørrissen, CC BY-SA 4.0, cropped.

Cardiff or Tirana?

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
  • families
  • shopping

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

Choose Tirana for

  • prices
  • beaches
  • food and drink

What lies behind each score is written up on Tirana’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, Tirana 46: Tirana leads by 16 points.
Food & drink. Cardiff 45, Tirana 57: Tirana leads by 12 points.
Culture & sights. Cardiff 58, Tirana 42: Cardiff leads by 16 points.
Nightlife. Cardiff 50, Tirana 58: Tirana leads by 8 points.
Nature & outdoors. Cardiff 70, Tirana 62: Cardiff leads by 8 points.
Day trips. Cardiff 72, Tirana 64: Cardiff leads by 8 points.
Good for families. Cardiff 58, Tirana 40: Cardiff leads by 18 points.
Getting around. Cardiff 66, Tirana 54: Cardiff leads by 12 points.
Shopping & style. Cardiff 50, Tirana 32: Cardiff leads by 18 points.
Affordability. Cardiff 46, Tirana 76: Tirana leads by 30 points.
Live music & performing arts. Cardiff 57, Tirana 32: Cardiff leads by 25 points.
Wellness & relaxation. Cardiff and Tirana are level on 27.
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What lies behind each score is written up on the two cities’ own pages: Cardiff and Tirana.

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 families with your weighting.

Tirana
49match

Wins on prices and beaches 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

Tirana in July

31 °Cdaytime high
17 °Cnight-time low
43 mmrain in the month
12 hsunshine a day
24 °Csea
15 hdaylight a day

Daytime high, °C

0°10°20°30°40°JFMAMJJASOND

Rainfall in the month, mm

050100150200JFMAMJJASOND
CardiffTirana

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). Tirana: 1961-1990 normals, Tirana (3 km from centre).

Before you go

MeasureCardiffTirana
Official languageEnglishAlbanian
CurrencyPound Sterling (GBP)Lek (ALL)
SocketsG230 V, 50 HzCF220 V, 50 Hz
Driving sideLeftRight
Time zoneUTC, UTC+1 in summerUTC+1, UTC+2 in summer
Emergency number112 or 999112
Elevation41 m110 m
Main airportCardiff International Airport (CWL)15 km from centre30 non-stop destinationsTirana International Airport Mother Teresa (TIA)13 km from centre121 non-stop destinations
Public holidays this year8 days14 days

By the numbers

MeasureCardiffTirana
City population383,536389,323
People per km²2,7349,314
Museums within 10 km911
UNESCO World Heritage sites within 50 km10
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 Tirana 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 2026-11-01. Daily budgets are estimates from country price levels.