VacationSelector
Yellow colonial houses in the walled city, Cartagena
CartagenaYellow colonial houses in the walled city
Playa Tamarindo, Tamarindo
TamarindoPlaya Tamarindo

Photos: Cartagena by Dr. Thomas Liptak, CC BY-SA 4.0, cropped; Tamarindo by Jarle Naustvik, CC BY 2.0, cropped.

Cartagena or Tamarindo?

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
  • shopping
  • live music and the arts

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

Choose Tamarindo for

  • nature and the outdoors
  • beaches
  • families

What lies behind each score is written up on Tamarindo’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, Tamarindo 85: Tamarindo leads by 15 points.
Food & drink. Cartagena 62, Tamarindo 38: Cartagena leads by 24 points.
Culture & sights. Cartagena 68, Tamarindo 5: Cartagena leads by 63 points.
Nightlife. Cartagena 70, Tamarindo 45: Cartagena leads by 25 points.
Nature & outdoors. Cartagena 46, Tamarindo 76: Tamarindo leads by 30 points.
Day trips. Cartagena 33, Tamarindo 28: Cartagena leads by 5 points.
Good for families. Cartagena 40, Tamarindo 55: Tamarindo leads by 15 points.
Getting around. Cartagena 54, Tamarindo 32: Cartagena leads by 22 points.
Shopping & style. Cartagena 48, Tamarindo 18: Cartagena leads by 30 points.
Affordability. Cartagena 60, Tamarindo 36: Cartagena leads by 24 points.
Live music & performing arts. Cartagena 40, Tamarindo 10: Cartagena leads by 30 points.
Wellness & relaxation. Cartagena 40, Tamarindo 45: Tamarindo leads by 5 points.
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What lies behind each score is written up on the two cities’ own pages: Cartagena and Tamarindo.

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 shopping with your weighting.

Tamarindo
39match

Wins on nature and the outdoors and beaches 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

Tamarindo in July

33 °Cdaytime high
23 °Cnight-time low
129 mmrain in the month
No recordsunshine a day
29 °Csea
13 hdaylight a day

Daytime high, °C

0°10°20°30°40°JFMAMJJASOND

Rainfall in the month, mm

0100200300400JFMAMJJASOND
CartagenaTamarindo

Where the figures come from

Tamarindo's temperatures are measured 54 km from the centre, at Liberia.

Tamarindo 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). Tamarindo: 1991-2020 normals, Liberia (53.8 km from centre).

Before you go

MeasureCartagenaTamarindo
Official languageSpanishSpanish
CurrencyColombian Peso (COP)Costa Rican Colon (CRC)
SocketsAB110 V, 60 HzAB120 V, 60 Hz
Driving sideRightRight
Time zoneUTC-5UTC-6
Emergency number123911
Elevation2 m27 m
Main airportRafael Nuñez International Airport (CTG)2 km from centre26 non-stop destinationsDaniel Oduber Quirós International Airport (LIR)43 km from centre30 non-stop destinations
Public holidays this year19 days11 days

By the numbers

MeasureCartagenaTamarindo
City population914,5527,132
People per km²1,59957
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 Tamarindo 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 2026-11-02. Daily budgets are estimates from country price levels.