VacationSelector
Yellow colonial houses in the walled city, Cartagena
CartagenaYellow colonial houses in the walled city
Sugarloaf Mountain above the boats in Botafogo Bay, Rio de Janeiro
Rio de JaneiroSugarloaf Mountain above the boats in Botafogo Bay

Photos: Cartagena by Dr. Thomas Liptak, CC BY-SA 4.0, cropped; Rio de Janeiro by Arne Müseler, CC BY-SA 3.0 DE, cropped.

Cartagena or Rio de Janeiro?

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

  • getting around
  • wellness

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

Choose Rio de Janeiro for

  • nature and the outdoors
  • live music and the arts
  • beaches

What lies behind each score is written up on Rio de Janeiro’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, Rio de Janeiro 92: Rio de Janeiro leads by 22 points.
Food & drink. Cartagena and Rio de Janeiro are level on 62.
Culture & sights. Cartagena and Rio de Janeiro are level on 68.
Nightlife. Cartagena 70, Rio de Janeiro 80: Rio de Janeiro leads by 10 points.
Nature & outdoors. Cartagena 46, Rio de Janeiro 90: Rio de Janeiro leads by 44 points.
Day trips. Cartagena 33, Rio de Janeiro 50: Rio de Janeiro leads by 17 points.
Good for families. Cartagena 40, Rio de Janeiro 50: Rio de Janeiro leads by 10 points.
Getting around. Cartagena 54, Rio de Janeiro 44: Cartagena leads by 10 points.
Shopping & style. Cartagena 48, Rio de Janeiro 50: Rio de Janeiro leads by 2 points.
Affordability. Cartagena and Rio de Janeiro are level on 60.
Live music & performing arts. Cartagena 40, Rio de Janeiro 66: Rio de Janeiro leads by 26 points.
Wellness & relaxation. Cartagena 40, Rio de Janeiro 30: Cartagena leads by 10 points.
0255075100

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

Your match

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

Cartagena
53match

Wins on getting around and wellness with your weighting.

Rio de Janeiro
Best match
62match

Wins on nature and the outdoors and live music and the arts 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

Rio de Janeiro in July

24 °Cdaytime high
18 °Cnight-time low
45 mmrain in the month
No recordsunshine a day
22 °Csea
11 hdaylight a day

Daytime high, °C

0°10°20°30°40°JFMAMJJASOND

Rainfall in the month, mm

050100150200250JFMAMJJASOND
CartagenaRio de Janeiro

Where the figures come from

Rio de Janeiro has no weather station within reach, so its figures come from a gridded climate model rather than a measured record, and read a broad area rather than the city itself.

Temperature and rainfall are climate normals, averaged over the years shown. Cartagena: 1991-2020 normals, Cartagena / Rafael Nunez (3.1 km from centre). Rio de Janeiro: 2001-2020 normals, NASA POWER reanalysis grid, no weather station within 90 km.

Before you go

MeasureCartagenaRio de Janeiro
Official languageSpanishPortuguese
CurrencyColombian Peso (COP)Brazilian Real (BRL)
SocketsAB110 V, 60 HzCN60 Hz
Driving sideRightRight
Time zoneUTC-5UTC-3
Emergency number123Police 190, ambulance 192, fire 193
Elevation2 m31 m
Main airportRafael Nuñez International Airport (CTG)2 km from centre26 non-stop destinationsRio de Janeiro Galeão – Tom Jobim International Airport (GIG)12 km from centre54 non-stop destinations
Public holidays this year19 days14 days

By the numbers

MeasureCartagenaRio de Janeiro
City population914,5526,211,223
People per km²1,5994,930
Museums within 10 km269
UNESCO World Heritage sites within 50 km13
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 Rio de Janeiro 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. Temperature and rainfall for destinations with no weather station are from the NASA POWER 2001-2020 climatology, derived from MERRA-2. 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.