VacationSelector
Yellow colonial houses in the walled city, Cartagena
CartagenaYellow colonial houses in the walled city
Portofino and its bay from the hillside, Portofino
PortofinoPortofino and its bay from the hillside

Photos: Cartagena by Dr. Thomas Liptak, CC BY-SA 4.0, cropped; Portofino by Michal Osmenda, CC BY 2.0, cropped.

Cartagena or Portofino?

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

  • nightlife
  • prices
  • culture and sights

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

Choose Portofino for

  • day trips
  • nature and the outdoors
  • wellness

What lies behind each score is written up on Portofino’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, Portofino 60: Cartagena leads by 10 points.
Food & drink. Cartagena 62, Portofino 36: Cartagena leads by 26 points.
Culture & sights. Cartagena 68, Portofino 22: Cartagena leads by 46 points.
Nightlife. Cartagena 70, Portofino 14: Cartagena leads by 56 points.
Nature & outdoors. Cartagena 46, Portofino 77: Portofino leads by 31 points.
Day trips. Cartagena 33, Portofino 76: Portofino leads by 43 points.
Good for families. Cartagena 40, Portofino 33: Cartagena leads by 7 points.
Getting around. Cartagena 54, Portofino 50: Cartagena leads by 4 points.
Shopping & style. Cartagena 48, Portofino 29: Cartagena leads by 19 points.
Affordability. Cartagena 60, Portofino 9: Cartagena leads by 51 points.
Live music & performing arts. Cartagena 40, Portofino 7: Cartagena leads by 33 points.
Wellness & relaxation. Cartagena 40, Portofino 42: Portofino leads by 2 points.
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What lies behind each score is written up on the two cities’ own pages: Cartagena and Portofino.

Your match

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

Cartagena
Best match
53match

Wins on nightlife and prices with your weighting.

Portofino
38match

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

Portofino in July

27 °Cdaytime high
22 °Cnight-time low
32 mmrain in the month
No recordsunshine a day
24 °Csea
15 hdaylight a day

Daytime high, °C

0°10°20°30°40°JFMAMJJASOND

Rainfall in the month, mm

050100150200250JFMAMJJASOND
CartagenaPortofino

Where the figures come from

Portofino's temperatures are measured 31 km from the centre, at Genova / Sestri.

Portofino 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). Portofino: 1991-2020 normals, Genova / Sestri (31 km from centre).

Before you go

MeasureCartagenaPortofino
Official languageSpanishItalian
CurrencyColombian Peso (COP)Euro (EUR)
SocketsAB110 V, 60 HzCFL230 V, 50 Hz
Driving sideRightRight
Time zoneUTC-5UTC+1, UTC+2 in summer
Emergency number123112
Elevation2 m20 m
Main airportRafael Nuñez International Airport (CTG)2 km from centre26 non-stop destinationsGenoa Cristoforo Colombo Airport (GOA)32 km from centre25 non-stop destinations
Public holidays this year19 days13 days

By the numbers

MeasureCartagenaPortofino
City population914,552355
People per km²1,599142
Museums within 10 km214
UNESCO World Heritage sites within 50 km12
Swim season, months above 21 °C12 months4 months

Where else could you go?

Every comparison below shares a destination with this one, so you can follow Cartagena or Portofino 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. Ground elevations sampled from the Mapzen terrain tiles via OpenTopoData, merging SRTM, ASTER, NED, EU-DEM and national sources. 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. 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 2026-11-02. Daily budgets are estimates from country price levels.