VacationSelector
Yellow colonial houses in the walled city, Cartagena
CartagenaYellow colonial houses in the walled city
The steamboat Natchez on the Mississippi, New Orleans
New OrleansThe steamboat Natchez on the Mississippi

Photos: Cartagena by Dr. Thomas Liptak, CC BY-SA 4.0, cropped; New Orleans by Bernard Spragg, CC0.

Cartagena or New Orleans?

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

  • beaches
  • prices
  • wellness

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

Choose New Orleans for

  • live music and the arts
  • food and drink
  • day trips

What lies behind each score is written up on New Orleans’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, New Orleans 14: Cartagena leads by 56 points.
Food & drink. Cartagena 62, New Orleans 84: New Orleans leads by 22 points.
Culture & sights. Cartagena 68, New Orleans 67: Cartagena leads by 1 points.
Nightlife. Cartagena 70, New Orleans 85: New Orleans leads by 15 points.
Nature & outdoors. Cartagena 46, New Orleans 42: Cartagena leads by 4 points.
Day trips. Cartagena 33, New Orleans 52: New Orleans leads by 19 points.
Good for families. Cartagena 40, New Orleans 55: New Orleans leads by 15 points.
Getting around. Cartagena 54, New Orleans 55: New Orleans leads by 1 points.
Shopping & style. Cartagena 48, New Orleans 54: New Orleans leads by 6 points.
Affordability. Cartagena 60, New Orleans 40: Cartagena leads by 20 points.
Live music & performing arts. Cartagena 40, New Orleans 80: New Orleans leads by 40 points.
Wellness & relaxation. Cartagena 40, New Orleans 25: Cartagena leads by 15 points.
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What lies behind each score is written up on the two cities’ own pages: Cartagena and New Orleans.

Your match

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

Too close to call, 1 point apart

Cartagena
53match

Wins on beaches and prices with your weighting.

New Orleans
54match

Wins on live music and the arts 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.

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

New Orleans in July

33 °Cdaytime high
24 °Cnight-time low
169 mmrain in the month
No recordsunshine a day
30 °Csea
14 hdaylight a day

Daytime high, °C

0°10°20°30°40°JFMAMJJASOND

Rainfall in the month, mm

050100150200250JFMAMJJASOND
CartagenaNew Orleans

Temperature and rainfall are climate normals, averaged over the years shown. Cartagena: 1991-2020 normals, Cartagena / Rafael Nunez (3.1 km from centre). New Orleans: 1991-2020 normals, New Orleans Airport (2.7 km from centre).

Before you go

MeasureCartagenaNew Orleans
Official languageSpanish-
CurrencyColombian Peso (COP)US Dollar (USD)
SocketsAB110 V, 60 HzAB120 V, 60 Hz
Driving sideRightRight
Time zoneUTC-5UTC-6, UTC-5 in summer
Emergency number123911
Elevation2 m-2 m
Main airportRafael Nuñez International Airport (CTG)2 km from centre26 non-stop destinationsLouis Armstrong New Orleans International Airport (MSY)18 km from centre51 non-stop destinations
Public holidays this year19 days14 days

By the numbers

MeasureCartagenaNew Orleans
City population914,552383,997
People per km²1,599423
Museums within 10 km216
UNESCO World Heritage sites within 50 km10
Swim season, months above 21 °C12 months7 months

Where else could you go?

Every comparison below shares a destination with this one, so you can follow Cartagena or New Orleans 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. 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 2026-10-31. Daily budgets are estimates from country price levels.