VacationSelector
The pastel houses of Rainbow Row, Charleston
CharlestonThe pastel houses of Rainbow Row
Bougainvillea and the dome of Agia Napa Cathedral, Limassol
LimassolBougainvillea and the dome of Agia Napa Cathedral

Photos: Charleston by NealVickers, CC BY-SA 4.0, cropped; Limassol by Julian Lupyan, CC0.

Charleston or Limassol?

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
  • food and drink
  • shopping

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

Choose Limassol for

  • prices
  • day trips
  • nature and the outdoors

What lies behind each score is written up on Limassol’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, Limassol 77: Limassol leads by 5 points.
Food & drink. Charleston 72, Limassol 58: Charleston leads by 14 points.
Culture & sights. Charleston 64, Limassol 38: Charleston leads by 26 points.
Nightlife. Charleston 44, Limassol 50: Limassol leads by 6 points.
Nature & outdoors. Charleston 55, Limassol 65: Limassol leads by 10 points.
Day trips. Charleston 62, Limassol 76: Limassol leads by 14 points.
Good for families. Charleston 60, Limassol 63: Limassol leads by 3 points.
Getting around. Charleston 46, Limassol 38: Charleston leads by 8 points.
Shopping & style. Charleston 55, Limassol 42: Charleston leads by 13 points.
Affordability. Charleston 27, Limassol 44: Limassol leads by 17 points.
Live music & performing arts. Charleston 42, Limassol 32: Charleston leads by 10 points.
Wellness & relaxation. Charleston 40, Limassol 42: Limassol leads by 2 points.
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What lies behind each score is written up on the two cities’ own pages: Charleston and Limassol.

Your match

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

Too close to call, 1 point apart

Charleston
53match

Wins on culture and sights and food and drink with your weighting.

Limassol
52match

Wins on prices and day trips 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

Limassol in July

31 °Cdaytime high
24 °Cnight-time low
1 mmrain in the month
13 hsunshine a day
26 °Csea
14 hdaylight a day

Daytime high, °C

0°10°20°30°40°JFMAMJJASOND

Rainfall in the month, mm

050100150200JFMAMJJASOND
CharlestonLimassol

Where the figures come from

Limassol 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.

Limassol's sunshine is measured 59 km from the centre, at Larnaca Airport.

Temperature and rainfall are climate normals, averaged over the years shown. Charleston: 1991-2020 normals, Charleston Airport (16.1 km from centre). Limassol: 1998-2020 (sunshine 1991-2020, rainfall 1991-2020) normals, Akrotiri (11.6 km from centre).

Before you go

MeasureCharlestonLimassol
Official language-Turkish, Greek, Modern Greek
CurrencyUS Dollar (USD)Euro (EUR)
SocketsAB120 V, 60 HzG240 V, 50 Hz
Driving sideRightLeft
Time zoneUTC-5, UTC-4 in summerUTC+2, UTC+3 in summer
Emergency number911112
Elevation6 m10 m
Main airportCharleston International Airport (CHS)16 km from centre56 non-stop destinationsLarnaca International Airport (LCA)58 km from centre112 non-stop destinations
Public holidays this year12 days17 days

By the numbers

MeasureCharlestonLimassol
City population150,227107,970
People per km²5322,405
Museums within 10 km192
UNESCO World Heritage sites within 50 km03
Swim season, months above 21 °C6 months6 months

Where else could you go?

Every comparison below shares a destination with this one, so you can follow Charleston or Limassol 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. Tourism statistics from Eurostat, © European Union, reused under CC BY 4.0. 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.