VacationSelector
Yellow colonial houses in the walled city, Cartagena
CartagenaYellow colonial houses in the walled city
The Treasury, Al-Khazneh, cut into the rock, Petra
PetraThe Treasury, Al-Khazneh, cut into the rock

Photos: Cartagena by Dr. Thomas Liptak, CC BY-SA 4.0, cropped; Petra by Yasir Gürbüz, Pexels License.

Cartagena 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 Cartagena for

  • beaches
  • nightlife
  • food and drink

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

Choose Petra for

  • nature and the outdoors
  • culture and sights

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. Cartagena 70, Petra 5: Cartagena leads by 65 points.
Food & drink. Cartagena 62, Petra 22: Cartagena leads by 40 points.
Culture & sights. Cartagena 68, Petra 85: Petra leads by 17 points.
Nightlife. Cartagena 70, Petra 5: Cartagena leads by 65 points.
Nature & outdoors. Cartagena 46, Petra 78: Petra leads by 32 points.
Day trips. Cartagena 33, Petra 30: Cartagena leads by 3 points.
Good for families. Cartagena 40, Petra 25: Cartagena leads by 15 points.
Getting around. Cartagena 54, Petra 25: Cartagena leads by 29 points.
Shopping & style. Cartagena 48, Petra 18: Cartagena leads by 30 points.
Affordability. Cartagena 60, Petra 45: Cartagena leads by 15 points.
Live music & performing arts. Cartagena 40, Petra 10: Cartagena leads by 30 points.
Wellness & relaxation. Cartagena 40, Petra 28: Cartagena leads by 12 points.
0255075100

What lies behind each score is written up on the two cities’ own pages: Cartagena and Petra.

Your match

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

Cartagena
Best match
53match

Wins on beaches and nightlife with your weighting.

Petra
31match

Wins on nature and the outdoors and culture and sights 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

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

050100150200250JFMAMJJASOND
CartagenaPetra

Where the figures come from

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. Cartagena: 1991-2020 normals, Cartagena / Rafael Nunez (3.1 km from centre). Petra: 1991-2020 normals, Ma'An (33.9 km from centre).

Before you go

MeasureCartagenaPetra
Official languageSpanishArabic
CurrencyColombian Peso (COP)Jordanian Dinar (JOD)
SocketsAB110 V, 60 HzBCFGJ230 V, 50 Hz
Driving sideRightRight
Time zoneUTC-5UTC+3
Emergency number123911
Elevation2 m850 m
Main airportRafael Nuñez International Airport (CTG)2 km from centre26 non-stop destinationsKing Hussein International Airport (AQJ)90 km from centre5 non-stop destinations
Public holidays this year19 days-

By the numbers

MeasureCartagenaPetra
City population914,552-
People per km²1,599-
Museums within 10 km22
UNESCO World Heritage sites within 50 km11
Swim season, months above 21 °C12 months-

Where else could you go?

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

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.