VacationSelector
The pastel houses of Rainbow Row, Charleston
CharlestonThe pastel houses of Rainbow Row
The pagoda at Kiyomizu-dera, Kyoto
KyotoThe pagoda at Kiyomizu-dera

Photos: Charleston by NealVickers, CC BY-SA 4.0, cropped; Kyoto by Bert Mulder, Pexels License.

Charleston or Kyoto?

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
  • nightlife

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

Choose Kyoto for

  • day trips
  • culture and sights
  • wellness

What lies behind each score is written up on Kyoto’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, Kyoto 15: Charleston leads by 57 points.
Food & drink. Charleston 72, Kyoto 85: Kyoto leads by 13 points.
Culture & sights. Charleston 64, Kyoto 96: Kyoto leads by 32 points.
Nightlife. Charleston 44, Kyoto 35: Charleston leads by 9 points.
Nature & outdoors. Charleston 55, Kyoto 70: Kyoto leads by 15 points.
Day trips. Charleston 62, Kyoto 96: Kyoto leads by 34 points.
Good for families. Charleston 60, Kyoto 68: Kyoto leads by 8 points.
Getting around. Charleston 46, Kyoto 72: Kyoto leads by 26 points.
Shopping & style. Charleston 55, Kyoto 72: Kyoto leads by 17 points.
Affordability. Charleston 27, Kyoto 50: Kyoto leads by 23 points.
Live music & performing arts. Charleston 42, Kyoto 60: Kyoto leads by 18 points.
Wellness & relaxation. Charleston 40, Kyoto 70: Kyoto leads by 30 points.
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What lies behind each score is written up on the two cities’ own pages: Charleston and Kyoto.

Your match

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

Charleston
53match

Wins on beaches and nightlife with your weighting.

Kyoto
Best match
66match

Wins on day trips and culture and sights 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

Kyoto in July

31 °Cdaytime high
23 °Cnight-time low
225 mmrain in the month
6 hsunshine a day
25 °Csea
14 hdaylight a day

Daytime high, °C

0°10°20°30°40°JFMAMJJASOND

Rainfall in the month, mm

050100150200250JFMAMJJASOND
CharlestonKyoto

Where the figures come from

Kyoto's sunshine is measured 43 km from the centre, at Osaka.

Temperature and rainfall are climate normals, averaged over the years shown. Charleston: 1991-2020 normals, Charleston Airport (16.1 km from centre). Kyoto: 1971-2000 (sunshine 1991-2020) normals, Kyoto (3.2 km from centre).

Before you go

MeasureCharlestonKyoto
Official language-Japanese
CurrencyUS Dollar (USD)Yen (JPY)
SocketsAB120 V, 60 HzAB100 V, 50 and 60 Hz depending on the region
Driving sideRightLeft
Time zoneUTC-5, UTC-4 in summerUTC+9
Emergency number911Police 110, fire 119
Elevation6 m51 m
Main airportCharleston International Airport (CHS)16 km from centre56 non-stop destinationsKansai International Airport (KIX)81 km from centre62 non-stop destinations
Public holidays this year12 days16 days

By the numbers

MeasureCharlestonKyoto
City population150,2271,463,723
People per km²5321,768
Museums within 10 km1977
UNESCO World Heritage sites within 50 km04
Swim season, months above 21 °C6 months5 months

Where else could you go?

Every comparison below shares a destination with this one, so you can follow Charleston or Kyoto 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. Ground elevations sampled from the Mapzen terrain tiles via OpenTopoData, merging SRTM, ASTER, NED, EU-DEM and national sources. 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.