VacationSelector
Yellow colonial houses in the walled city, Cartagena
CartagenaYellow colonial houses in the walled city
Playa Manzanillo, Puerto Escondido
Puerto EscondidoPlaya Manzanillo

Photos: Cartagena by Dr. Thomas Liptak, CC BY-SA 4.0, cropped; Puerto Escondido by theklan, CC BY-SA 2.0, cropped.

Cartagena or Puerto Escondido?

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
  • shopping

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

Choose Puerto Escondido for

  • nature and the outdoors
  • wellness
  • beaches

What lies behind each score is written up on Puerto Escondido’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, Puerto Escondido 82: Puerto Escondido leads by 12 points.
Food & drink. Cartagena 62, Puerto Escondido 48: Cartagena leads by 14 points.
Culture & sights. Cartagena 68, Puerto Escondido 8: Cartagena leads by 60 points.
Nightlife. Cartagena 70, Puerto Escondido 45: Cartagena leads by 25 points.
Nature & outdoors. Cartagena 46, Puerto Escondido 78: Puerto Escondido leads by 32 points.
Day trips. Cartagena 33, Puerto Escondido 35: Puerto Escondido leads by 2 points.
Good for families. Cartagena 40, Puerto Escondido 42: Puerto Escondido leads by 2 points.
Getting around. Cartagena 54, Puerto Escondido 40: Cartagena leads by 14 points.
Shopping & style. Cartagena 48, Puerto Escondido 22: Cartagena leads by 26 points.
Affordability. Cartagena 60, Puerto Escondido 68: Puerto Escondido leads by 8 points.
Live music & performing arts. Cartagena 40, Puerto Escondido 12: Cartagena leads by 28 points.
Wellness & relaxation. Cartagena 40, Puerto Escondido 58: Puerto Escondido leads by 18 points.
0255075100

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

Your match

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

Cartagena
Best match
53match

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

Puerto Escondido
45match

Wins on nature and the outdoors and wellness 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

Puerto Escondido in July

33 °Cdaytime high
24 °Cnight-time low
116 mmrain in the month
7 hsunshine a day
30 °Csea
13 hdaylight a day

Daytime high, °C

0°10°20°30°40°JFMAMJJASOND

Rainfall in the month, mm

050100150200250JFMAMJJASOND
CartagenaPuerto Escondido

Where the figures come from

Puerto Escondido's temperatures are measured 66 km from the centre, at Puerto Angel, Oax..

Puerto Escondido 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). Puerto Escondido: 1991-2020 normals, Puerto Angel, Oax. (65.6 km from centre).

Before you go

MeasureCartagenaPuerto Escondido
Official languageSpanishSpanish, Nahuatl, Yucatec Maya
CurrencyColombian Peso (COP)Mexican Peso (MXN)
SocketsAB110 V, 60 HzAB127 V, 60 Hz
Driving sideRightRight
Time zoneUTC-5UTC-6
Emergency number123911
Elevation2 m60 m
Main airportRafael Nuñez International Airport (CTG)2 km from centre26 non-stop destinationsPuerto Escondido International Airport (PXM)2 km from centre10 non-stop destinations
Public holidays this year19 days9 days

By the numbers

MeasureCartagenaPuerto Escondido
City population914,55229,903
People per km²1,599-
Museums within 10 km20
UNESCO World Heritage sites within 50 km10
Swim season, months above 21 °C12 months12 months

Where else could you go?

Every comparison below shares a destination with this one, so you can follow Cartagena or Puerto Escondido 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 2026-11-02. Daily budgets are estimates from country price levels.