VacationSelector
The pastel houses of Rainbow Row, Charleston
CharlestonThe pastel houses of Rainbow Row
The entrance to the Big Lagoon, El Nido
El NidoThe entrance to the Big Lagoon

Photos: Charleston by NealVickers, CC BY-SA 4.0, cropped; El Nido by nennnn, CC BY 2.0, cropped.

Charleston or El Nido?

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

  • culture and sights
  • day trips
  • shopping

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

Choose El Nido for

  • prices
  • nature and the outdoors
  • beaches

What lies behind each score is written up on El Nido’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, El Nido 92: El Nido leads by 20 points.
Food & drink. Charleston 72, El Nido 27: Charleston leads by 45 points.
Culture & sights. Charleston 64, El Nido 4: Charleston leads by 60 points.
Nightlife. Charleston 44, El Nido 30: Charleston leads by 14 points.
Nature & outdoors. Charleston 55, El Nido 87: El Nido leads by 32 points.
Day trips. Charleston 62, El Nido 8: Charleston leads by 54 points.
Good for families. Charleston 60, El Nido 40: Charleston leads by 20 points.
Getting around. Charleston 46, El Nido 22: Charleston leads by 24 points.
Shopping & style. Charleston 55, El Nido 7: Charleston leads by 48 points.
Affordability. Charleston 27, El Nido 64: El Nido leads by 37 points.
Live music & performing arts. Charleston 42, El Nido 7: Charleston leads by 35 points.
Wellness & relaxation. Charleston 40, El Nido 46: El Nido leads by 6 points.
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What lies behind each score is written up on the two cities’ own pages: Charleston and El Nido.

Your match

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

Charleston
Best match
53match

Wins on culture and sights and day trips with your weighting.

El Nido
36match

Wins on prices 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.

Charleston in July

33 °Cdaytime high
23 °Cnight-time low
167 mmrain in the month
28 °Csea
14 hdaylight a day

El Nido in July

29 °Cdaytime high
27 °Cnight-time low
368 mmrain in the month
29 °Csea
13 hdaylight a day

Daytime high, °C

0°10°20°30°40°JFMAMJJASOND

Rainfall in the month, mm

0100200300400JFMAMJJASOND
CharlestonEl Nido

Where the figures come from

El Nido 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. Charleston: 1991-2020 normals, Charleston Airport (16.1 km from centre). El Nido: 2001-2020 normals, NASA POWER reanalysis grid, no weather station within 90 km.

Before you go

MeasureCharlestonEl Nido
Official language-English, Filipino, Taglish
CurrencyUS Dollar (USD)Philippine Peso (PHP)
SocketsAB120 V, 60 HzABC220 V, 60 Hz
Driving sideRightRight
Time zoneUTC-5, UTC-4 in summerUTC+8
Emergency number911911
Elevation6 m35 m
Main airportCharleston International Airport (CHS)16 km from centre56 non-stop destinationsEl Nido Airport (ENI)4 km from centre5 non-stop destinations
Public holidays this year12 days18 days

By the numbers

MeasureCharlestonEl Nido
City population150,22751,367
People per km²53256
Museums within 10 km190
UNESCO World Heritage sites within 50 km00
Swim season, months above 21 °C6 months12 months

Where else could you go?

Every comparison below shares a destination with this one, so you can follow Charleston or El Nido 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 2026-11-02. Daily budgets are estimates from country price levels.