VacationSelector
Fort San Pedro in Cebu City, Cebu
CebuFort San Pedro in Cebu City
A boat in the swell beside El Arco, Los Cabos
Los CabosA boat in the swell beside El Arco

Photos: Cebu by xiquinhosilva, CC BY 2.0, cropped; Los Cabos by Jules Clark, Pexels License.

Cebu or Los Cabos?

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 Cebu for

  • prices
  • culture and sights
  • live music and the arts

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

Choose Los Cabos for

  • beaches
  • nightlife
  • nature and the outdoors

What lies behind each score is written up on Los Cabos’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. Cebu 60, Los Cabos 84: Los Cabos leads by 24 points.
Food & drink. Cebu 58, Los Cabos 54: Cebu leads by 4 points.
Culture & sights. Cebu 40, Los Cabos 20: Cebu leads by 20 points.
Nightlife. Cebu 46, Los Cabos 66: Los Cabos leads by 20 points.
Nature & outdoors. Cebu 60, Los Cabos 78: Los Cabos leads by 18 points.
Day trips. Cebu 44, Los Cabos 42: Cebu leads by 2 points.
Good for families. Cebu 45, Los Cabos 55: Los Cabos leads by 10 points.
Getting around. Cebu 26, Los Cabos 28: Los Cabos leads by 2 points.
Shopping & style. Cebu 44, Los Cabos 36: Cebu leads by 8 points.
Affordability. Cebu 80, Los Cabos 28: Cebu leads by 52 points.
Live music & performing arts. Cebu 25, Los Cabos 12: Cebu leads by 13 points.
Wellness & relaxation. Cebu 50, Los Cabos 58: Los Cabos leads by 8 points.
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What lies behind each score is written up on the two cities’ own pages: Cebu and Los Cabos.

Your match

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

Too close to call, 1 point apart

Cebu
48match

Wins on prices and culture and sights with your weighting.

Los Cabos
47match

Wins on beaches and nightlife with your weighting.

What matters to you?

When should you go?

Pick your month. The climate figures are measured averages, not a forecast.

Cebu in July

32 °Cdaytime high
25 °Cnight-time low
205 mmrain in the month
29 °Csea
13 hdaylight a day

Los Cabos in July

30 °Cdaytime high
25 °Cnight-time low
19 mmrain in the month
26 °Csea
13 hdaylight a day

Daytime high, °C

0°10°20°30°40°JFMAMJJASOND

Rainfall in the month, mm

050100150200250JFMAMJJASOND
CebuLos Cabos

Where the figures come from

Los Cabos 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. Cebu: 1991-2020 normals, Mactan (7.1 km from centre). Los Cabos: 2001-2020 normals, NASA POWER reanalysis grid, no weather station within 90 km.

Before you go

MeasureCebuLos Cabos
Official languageEnglish, Filipino, TaglishSpanish, Nahuatl, Yucatec Maya
CurrencyPhilippine Peso (PHP)Mexican Peso (MXN)
SocketsABC220 V, 60 HzAB127 V, 60 Hz
Driving sideRightRight
Time zoneUTC+8UTC-7
Emergency number911911
Elevation135 m11 m
Main airportMactan Cebu International Airport (CEB)9 km from centre41 non-stop destinationsLos Cabos International Airport (SJD)35 km from centre54 non-stop destinations
Public holidays this year18 days9 days

By the numbers

MeasureCebuLos Cabos
City population965,332202,694
People per km²3,065-
Museums within 10 km51
UNESCO World Heritage sites within 50 km00
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 Cebu or Los Cabos 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). Exchange rates via Frankfurter, based on European Central Bank reference rates. 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. 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.