VacationSelector
Wat Chiang Man in the old city, Chiang Mai
Chiang MaiWat Chiang Man in the old city
The colonnaded court of Luxor Temple, Luxor
LuxorThe colonnaded court of Luxor Temple

Photos: Chiang Mai by Gije Cho, Pexels License; Luxor by Dennis G. Jarvis, CC BY-SA 2.0, cropped.

Chiang Mai or Luxor?

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
  • food and drink
  • nature and the outdoors

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

Choose Luxor for

  • culture and sights
  • day trips

What lies behind each score is written up on Luxor’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 and Luxor are level on 6.
Food & drink. Chiang Mai 78, Luxor 30: Chiang Mai leads by 48 points.
Culture & sights. Chiang Mai 65, Luxor 95: Luxor leads by 30 points.
Nightlife. Chiang Mai 45, Luxor 10: Chiang Mai leads by 35 points.
Nature & outdoors. Chiang Mai 73, Luxor 32: Chiang Mai leads by 41 points.
Day trips. Chiang Mai 48, Luxor 62: Luxor leads by 14 points.
Good for families. Chiang Mai 55, Luxor 30: Chiang Mai leads by 25 points.
Getting around. Chiang Mai 38, Luxor 35: Chiang Mai leads by 3 points.
Shopping & style. Chiang Mai 62, Luxor 25: Chiang Mai leads by 37 points.
Affordability. Chiang Mai and Luxor are level on 90.
Live music & performing arts. Chiang Mai 30, Luxor 10: Chiang Mai leads by 20 points.
Wellness & relaxation. Chiang Mai 82, Luxor 28: Chiang Mai leads by 54 points.
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What lies behind each score is written up on the two cities’ own pages: Chiang Mai and Luxor.

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 food and drink with your weighting.

Luxor
38match

Wins on culture and sights 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
13 hdaylight a day

Luxor in July

41 °Cdaytime high
27 °Cnight-time low
0 mmrain in the month
No recordsunshine a day
14 hdaylight a day

Daytime high, °C

0°10°20°30°40°50°JFMAMJJASOND

Rainfall in the month, mm

050100150200250JFMAMJJASOND
Chiang MaiLuxor

Where the figures come from

Luxor 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.

Temperature and rainfall are climate normals, averaged over the years shown. Chiang Mai: 1991-2020 normals, Chiang Mai (0.6 km from centre). Luxor: 1998-2020 (rainfall 1991-2020) normals, Luxor (6.5 km from centre).

Before you go

MeasureChiang MaiLuxor
Official languageThaiArabic
CurrencyBaht (THB)Egyptian Pound (EGP)
SocketsABCF220 V, 50 HzCF220 V, 50 Hz
Driving sideLeftRight
Time zoneUTC+7UTC+2, UTC+3 in summer
Emergency numberPolice 191, ambulance 1669, fire 199Police 122, ambulance 123, fire 180
Elevation310 m89 m
Main airportChiang Mai International Airport (CNX)3 km from centre28 non-stop destinationsLuxor International Airport (LXR)7 km from centre29 non-stop destinations
Public holidays this year-15 days

By the numbers

MeasureChiang MaiLuxor
City population1,198,000202,232
People per km²2,958486
Museums within 10 km64
UNESCO World Heritage sites within 50 km01

Where else could you go?

Every comparison below shares a destination with this one, so you can follow Chiang Mai or Luxor 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. Public holidays from Nager.Date (MIT). 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.