VacationSelector
Wat Chiang Man in the old city, Chiang Mai
Chiang MaiWat Chiang Man in the old city
The clock tower in the old town, Kotor
KotorThe clock tower in the old town

Photos: Chiang Mai by Gije Cho, Pexels License; Kotor by Muhammed Fatih Beki, Pexels License.

Chiang Mai or Kotor?

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 Chiang Mai for

  • wellness
  • shopping
  • food and drink

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

Choose Kotor for

  • beaches
  • day trips
  • getting around

What lies behind each score is written up on Kotor’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. Chiang Mai 6, Kotor 57: Kotor leads by 51 points.
Food & drink. Chiang Mai 78, Kotor 37: Chiang Mai leads by 41 points.
Culture & sights. Chiang Mai 65, Kotor 55: Chiang Mai leads by 10 points.
Nightlife. Chiang Mai 45, Kotor 30: Chiang Mai leads by 15 points.
Nature & outdoors. Chiang Mai 73, Kotor 80: Kotor leads by 7 points.
Day trips. Chiang Mai 48, Kotor 72: Kotor leads by 24 points.
Good for families. Chiang Mai 55, Kotor 36: Chiang Mai leads by 19 points.
Getting around. Chiang Mai 38, Kotor 48: Kotor leads by 10 points.
Shopping & style. Chiang Mai 62, Kotor 20: Chiang Mai leads by 42 points.
Affordability. Chiang Mai 90, Kotor 57: Chiang Mai leads by 33 points.
Live music & performing arts. Chiang Mai 30, Kotor 20: Chiang Mai leads by 10 points.
Wellness & relaxation. Chiang Mai 82, Kotor 24: Chiang Mai leads by 58 points.
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What lies behind each score is written up on the two cities’ own pages: Chiang Mai and Kotor.

Your match

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

Chiang Mai
Best match
56match

Wins on wellness and shopping with your weighting.

Kotor
45match

Wins on beaches 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.

Chiang Mai in July

32 °Cdaytime high
24 °Cnight-time low
153 mmrain in the month
4 hsunshine a day
No seasea
13 hdaylight a day

Kotor in July

31 °Cdaytime high
18 °Cnight-time low
39 mmrain in the month
11 hsunshine a day
25 °Csea
15 hdaylight a day

Daytime high, °C

0°10°20°30°40°JFMAMJJASOND

Rainfall in the month, mm

050100150200250JFMAMJJASOND
Chiang MaiKotor

Where the figures come from

Kotor 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.

Kotor's sunshine is measured 42 km from the centre, at Podgorica-Grad.

Temperature and rainfall are climate normals, averaged over the years shown. Chiang Mai: 1991-2020 normals, Chiang Mai (0.6 km from centre). Kotor: 1991-2020 normals, Tivat (4.2 km from centre).

Before you go

MeasureChiang MaiKotor
Official languageThaiMontenegrin
CurrencyBaht (THB)Euro (EUR)
SocketsABCF220 V, 50 HzCF230 V, 50 Hz
Driving sideLeftRight
Time zoneUTC+7UTC+1, UTC+2 in summer
Emergency numberPolice 191, ambulance 1669, fire 199112
Elevation310 m10 m
Main airportChiang Mai International Airport (CNX)3 km from centre28 non-stop destinationsTivat Airport (TIV)5 km from centre42 non-stop destinations

By the numbers

MeasureChiang MaiKotor
City population1,198,000562
People per km²2,958-
Museums within 10 km63
UNESCO World Heritage sites within 50 km03
Swim season, months above 21 °C-5 months

Where else could you go?

Every comparison below shares a destination with this one, so you can follow Chiang Mai or Kotor 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. Airport data from OurAirports (public domain). 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. Sea surface temperature from NOAA OISST v2.1, NOAA Physical Sciences Laboratory. 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.