VacationSelector
Yellow colonial houses in the walled city, Cartagena
CartagenaYellow colonial houses in the walled city
The harbour seen from above, Marmaris
MarmarisThe harbour seen from above

Photos: Cartagena by Dr. Thomas Liptak, CC BY-SA 4.0, cropped; Marmaris by Mstyslav Chernov, CC BY-SA 3.0, cropped.

Cartagena 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 Cartagena for

  • culture and sights
  • live music and the arts
  • food and drink

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

Choose Marmaris for

  • day trips
  • nature and the outdoors
  • families

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. Cartagena 70, Marmaris 80: Marmaris leads by 10 points.
Food & drink. Cartagena 62, Marmaris 40: Cartagena leads by 22 points.
Culture & sights. Cartagena 68, Marmaris 18: Cartagena leads by 50 points.
Nightlife. Cartagena 70, Marmaris 60: Cartagena leads by 10 points.
Nature & outdoors. Cartagena 46, Marmaris 72: Marmaris leads by 26 points.
Day trips. Cartagena 33, Marmaris 65: Marmaris leads by 32 points.
Good for families. Cartagena 40, Marmaris 62: Marmaris leads by 22 points.
Getting around. Cartagena 54, Marmaris 55: Marmaris leads by 1 points.
Shopping & style. Cartagena 48, Marmaris 38: Cartagena leads by 10 points.
Affordability. Cartagena 60, Marmaris 62: Marmaris leads by 2 points.
Live music & performing arts. Cartagena 40, Marmaris 12: Cartagena leads by 28 points.
Wellness & relaxation. Cartagena 40, Marmaris 50: Marmaris leads by 10 points.
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What lies behind each score is written up on the two cities’ own pages: Cartagena and Marmaris.

Your match

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

Too close to call, 2 points apart

Cartagena
53match

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

Marmaris
51match

Wins on day trips 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.

Cartagena in July

31 °Cdaytime high
26 °Cnight-time low
124 mmrain in the month
7 hsunshine a day
30 °Csea
13 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
CartagenaMarmaris

Where the figures come from

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. Cartagena: 1991-2020 normals, Cartagena / Rafael Nunez (3.1 km from centre). Marmaris: 2000-2020 (rainfall 1991-2020) normals, Dalaman (48.8 km from centre).

Before you go

MeasureCartagenaMarmaris
Official languageSpanishTurkish
CurrencyColombian Peso (COP)Turkish Lira (TRY)
SocketsAB110 V, 60 HzCF230 V, 50 Hz
Driving sideRightRight
Time zoneUTC-5UTC+3
Emergency number123112
Elevation2 m7 m
Main airportRafael Nuñez International Airport (CTG)2 km from centre26 non-stop destinationsDalaman International Airport (DLM)49 km from centre61 non-stop destinations
Public holidays this year19 days14 days

By the numbers

MeasureCartagenaMarmaris
City population914,55297,818
People per km²1,599111
Museums within 10 km21
UNESCO World Heritage sites within 50 km11
Swim season, months above 21 °C12 months6 months

Where else could you go?

Every comparison below shares a destination with this one, so you can follow Cartagena 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). 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. Exchange rates via Frankfurter, based on European Central Bank reference rates. 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.