VacationSelector
Wat Chiang Man in the old city, Chiang Mai
Chiang MaiWat Chiang Man in the old city
Palm Springs

Photos: Chiang Mai by Gije Cho, Pexels License.

Chiang Mai or Palm Springs?

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

  • prices
  • food and drink
  • culture and sights

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

Choose Palm Springs for

  • live music and the arts
  • nature and the outdoors
  • beaches

What lies behind each score is written up on Palm Springs’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, Palm Springs 7: Palm Springs leads by 1 points.
Food & drink. Chiang Mai 78, Palm Springs 40: Chiang Mai leads by 38 points.
Culture & sights. Chiang Mai 65, Palm Springs 42: Chiang Mai leads by 23 points.
Nightlife. Chiang Mai 45, Palm Springs 36: Chiang Mai leads by 9 points.
Nature & outdoors. Chiang Mai 73, Palm Springs 78: Palm Springs leads by 5 points.
Day trips. Chiang Mai 48, Palm Springs 38: Chiang Mai leads by 10 points.
Good for families. Chiang Mai 55, Palm Springs 40: Chiang Mai leads by 15 points.
Getting around. Chiang Mai 38, Palm Springs 22: Chiang Mai leads by 16 points.
Shopping & style. Chiang Mai 62, Palm Springs 44: Chiang Mai leads by 18 points.
Affordability. Chiang Mai 90, Palm Springs 32: Chiang Mai leads by 58 points.
Live music & performing arts. Chiang Mai 30, Palm Springs 40: Palm Springs leads by 10 points.
Wellness & relaxation. Chiang Mai 82, Palm Springs 80: Chiang Mai leads by 2 points.
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What lies behind each score is written up on the two cities’ own pages: Chiang Mai and Palm Springs.

Your match

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

Chiang Mai
Best match
56match

Wins on prices and food and drink with your weighting.

Palm Springs
42match

Wins on live music and the arts 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.

Chiang Mai in July

32 °Cdaytime high
24 °Cnight-time low
153 mmrain in the month
4 hsunshine a day
13 hdaylight a day

Palm Springs in July

42 °Cdaytime high
28 °Cnight-time low
5 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 MaiPalm Springs

Where the figures come from

Palm Springs 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). Palm Springs: 2006-2020 (rainfall 1991-2020) normals, Palm Springs (2.3 km from centre).

Before you go

MeasureChiang MaiPalm Springs
Official languageThai-
CurrencyBaht (THB)US Dollar (USD)
SocketsABCF220 V, 50 HzAB120 V, 60 Hz
Driving sideLeftRight
Time zoneUTC+7UTC-8, UTC-7 in summer
Emergency numberPolice 191, ambulance 1669, fire 199911
Elevation310 m146 m
Main airportChiang Mai International Airport (CNX)3 km from centre28 non-stop destinationsPalm Springs International Airport (PSP)2 km from centre29 non-stop destinations
Public holidays this year-13 days

By the numbers

MeasureChiang MaiPalm Springs
City population1,198,00044,575
People per km²2,958181
Museums within 10 km63
UNESCO World Heritage sites within 50 km00

Where else could you go?

Every comparison below shares a destination with this one, so you can follow Chiang Mai or Palm Springs 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 2026-11-01. Daily budgets are estimates from country price levels.