VacationSelector
The pastel houses of Rainbow Row, Charleston
CharlestonThe pastel houses of Rainbow Row
The Scott Monument and Princes Street Gardens, Edinburgh
EdinburghThe Scott Monument and Princes Street Gardens

Photos: Charleston by NealVickers, CC BY-SA 4.0, cropped; Edinburgh by Carlos Delgado, CC BY-SA 3.0, cropped.

Charleston or Edinburgh?

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 Charleston for

  • beaches
  • food and drink
  • wellness

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

Choose Edinburgh for

  • live music and the arts
  • getting around
  • nature and the outdoors

What lies behind each score is written up on Edinburgh’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. Charleston 72, Edinburgh 22: Charleston leads by 50 points.
Food & drink. Charleston 72, Edinburgh 53: Charleston leads by 19 points.
Culture & sights. Charleston 64, Edinburgh 75: Edinburgh leads by 11 points.
Nightlife. Charleston 44, Edinburgh 50: Edinburgh leads by 6 points.
Nature & outdoors. Charleston 55, Edinburgh 75: Edinburgh leads by 20 points.
Day trips. Charleston 62, Edinburgh 75: Edinburgh leads by 13 points.
Good for families. Charleston 60, Edinburgh 62: Edinburgh leads by 2 points.
Getting around. Charleston 46, Edinburgh 74: Edinburgh leads by 28 points.
Shopping & style. Charleston 55, Edinburgh 50: Charleston leads by 5 points.
Affordability. Charleston 27, Edinburgh 30: Edinburgh leads by 3 points.
Live music & performing arts. Charleston 42, Edinburgh 72: Edinburgh leads by 30 points.
Wellness & relaxation. Charleston 40, Edinburgh 34: Charleston leads by 6 points.
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What lies behind each score is written up on the two cities’ own pages: Charleston and Edinburgh.

Your match

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

Charleston
53match

Wins on beaches and food and drink with your weighting.

Edinburgh
Best match
56match

Wins on live music and the arts and getting around with your weighting.

What matters to you?

When should you go?

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

Charleston in July

33 °Cdaytime high
23 °Cnight-time low
167 mmrain in the month
No recordsunshine a day
28 °Csea
14 hdaylight a day

Edinburgh in July

19 °Cdaytime high
11 °Cnight-time low
66 mmrain in the month
5 hsunshine a day
14 °Csea
17 hdaylight a day

Daytime high, °C

0°10°20°30°40°JFMAMJJASOND

Rainfall in the month, mm

050100150200JFMAMJJASOND
CharlestonEdinburgh

Where the figures come from

Edinburgh 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.

Edinburgh's sunshine is measured 52 km from the centre, at Leuchars.

Temperature and rainfall are climate normals, averaged over the years shown. Charleston: 1991-2020 normals, Charleston Airport (16.1 km from centre). Edinburgh: 1991-2020 normals, Edinburgh Airport (10 km from centre).

Before you go

MeasureCharlestonEdinburgh
Official language-English
CurrencyUS Dollar (USD)Pound Sterling (GBP)
SocketsAB120 V, 60 HzG230 V, 50 Hz
Driving sideRightLeft
Time zoneUTC-5, UTC-4 in summerUTC, UTC+1 in summer
Emergency number911112 or 999
Elevation6 m47 m
Main airportCharleston International Airport (CHS)16 km from centre56 non-stop destinationsEdinburgh Airport (EDI)11 km from centre163 non-stop destinations
Public holidays this year12 days10 days

By the numbers

MeasureCharlestonEdinburgh
City population150,227488,050
People per km²5321,884
Museums within 10 km1932
UNESCO World Heritage sites within 50 km03
Swim season, months above 21 °C6 monthsNone

Where else could you go?

Every comparison below shares a destination with this one, so you can follow Charleston or Edinburgh 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. 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.