VacationSelector
Yellow colonial houses in the walled city, Cartagena
CartagenaYellow colonial houses in the walled city
The adobe New Mexico Museum of Art, Santa Fe
Santa FeThe adobe New Mexico Museum of Art

Photos: Cartagena by Dr. Thomas Liptak, CC BY-SA 4.0, cropped; Santa Fe by dconvertini, CC BY-SA 2.0, cropped.

Cartagena or Santa Fe?

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
  • prices

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

Choose Santa Fe for

  • day trips
  • nature and the outdoors
  • live music and the arts

What lies behind each score is written up on Santa Fe’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, Santa Fe 5: Cartagena leads by 65 points.
Food & drink. Cartagena and Santa Fe are level on 62.
Culture & sights. Cartagena 68, Santa Fe 66: Cartagena leads by 2 points.
Nightlife. Cartagena 70, Santa Fe 22: Cartagena leads by 48 points.
Nature & outdoors. Cartagena 46, Santa Fe 80: Santa Fe leads by 34 points.
Day trips. Cartagena 33, Santa Fe 70: Santa Fe leads by 37 points.
Good for families. Cartagena 40, Santa Fe 45: Santa Fe leads by 5 points.
Getting around. Cartagena 54, Santa Fe 40: Cartagena leads by 14 points.
Shopping & style. Cartagena 48, Santa Fe 62: Santa Fe leads by 14 points.
Affordability. Cartagena 60, Santa Fe 30: Cartagena leads by 30 points.
Live music & performing arts. Cartagena 40, Santa Fe 55: Santa Fe leads by 15 points.
Wellness & relaxation. Cartagena 40, Santa Fe 55: Santa Fe leads by 15 points.
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What lies behind each score is written up on the two cities’ own pages: Cartagena and Santa Fe.

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.

Santa Fe
49match

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

Santa Fe in July

31 °Cdaytime high
16 °Cnight-time low
60 mmrain in the month
No recordsunshine a day
No seasea
14 hdaylight a day

Daytime high, °C

0°10°20°30°40°JFMAMJJASOND

Rainfall in the month, mm

050100150200250JFMAMJJASOND
CartagenaSanta Fe

Where the figures come from

Santa Fe's station stands 199 m below the city centre, so the centre is likely a little cooler than the figures say.

Santa Fe 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). Santa Fe: 1991-2020 normals, Santa Fe / Cieneguilla (12.4 km from centre).

Before you go

MeasureCartagenaSanta Fe
Official languageSpanish-
CurrencyColombian Peso (COP)US Dollar (USD)
SocketsAB110 V, 60 HzAB120 V, 60 Hz
Driving sideRightRight
Time zoneUTC-5UTC-7, UTC-6 in summer
Emergency number123911
Elevation2 m2,134 m
Main airportRafael Nuñez International Airport (CTG)2 km from centre26 non-stop destinationsSanta Fe Municipal Airport (SAF)12 km from centre5 non-stop destinations
Public holidays this year19 days13 days

By the numbers

MeasureCartagenaSanta Fe
City population914,55287,505
People per km²1,599645
Museums within 10 km210
UNESCO World Heritage sites within 50 km10
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 Santa Fe 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 2026-11-01. Daily budgets are estimates from country price levels.