VacationSelector
Wat Chiang Man in the old city, Chiang Mai
Chiang MaiWat Chiang Man in the old city
The pink Don CeSar hotel seen from the beach, St. Pete Beach
St. Pete BeachThe pink Don CeSar hotel seen from the beach

Photos: Chiang Mai by Gije Cho, Pexels License; St. Pete Beach by Jeffrey Eisen, Pexels License.

Chiang Mai or St. Pete Beach?

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
  • culture and sights
  • shopping

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

Choose St. Pete Beach for

  • beaches
  • families
  • day trips

What lies behind each score is written up on St. Pete Beach’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, St. Pete Beach 87: St. Pete Beach leads by 81 points.
Food & drink. Chiang Mai 78, St. Pete Beach 40: Chiang Mai leads by 38 points.
Culture & sights. Chiang Mai 65, St. Pete Beach 18: Chiang Mai leads by 47 points.
Nightlife. Chiang Mai 45, St. Pete Beach 28: Chiang Mai leads by 17 points.
Nature & outdoors. Chiang Mai 73, St. Pete Beach 57: Chiang Mai leads by 16 points.
Day trips. Chiang Mai 48, St. Pete Beach 58: St. Pete Beach leads by 10 points.
Good for families. Chiang Mai 55, St. Pete Beach 72: St. Pete Beach leads by 17 points.
Getting around. Chiang Mai 38, St. Pete Beach 30: Chiang Mai leads by 8 points.
Shopping & style. Chiang Mai 62, St. Pete Beach 20: Chiang Mai leads by 42 points.
Affordability. Chiang Mai 90, St. Pete Beach 32: Chiang Mai leads by 58 points.
Live music & performing arts. Chiang Mai 30, St. Pete Beach 20: Chiang Mai leads by 10 points.
Wellness & relaxation. Chiang Mai 82, St. Pete Beach 42: Chiang Mai leads by 40 points.
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What lies behind each score is written up on the two cities’ own pages: Chiang Mai and St. Pete Beach.

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 culture and sights with your weighting.

St. Pete Beach
42match

Wins on beaches and families 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

St. Pete Beach in July

32 °Cdaytime high
26 °Cnight-time low
185 mmrain in the month
9 hsunshine a day
30 °Csea
14 hdaylight a day

Daytime high, °C

0°10°20°30°40°JFMAMJJASOND

Rainfall in the month, mm

050100150200250JFMAMJJASOND
Chiang MaiSt. Pete Beach

Where the figures come from

St. Pete Beach 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.

St. Pete Beach's sunshine is measured 34 km from the centre, at Tampa International Airport.

Temperature and rainfall are climate normals, averaged over the years shown. Chiang Mai: 1991-2020 normals, Chiang Mai (0.6 km from centre). St. Pete Beach: 1998-2020 (sunshine 1991-2020, rainfall 1991-2020) normals, Saint Petersburg (12.2 km from centre).

Before you go

MeasureChiang MaiSt. Pete Beach
Official languageThai-
CurrencyBaht (THB)US Dollar (USD)
SocketsABCF220 V, 50 HzAB120 V, 60 Hz
Driving sideLeftRight
Time zoneUTC+7UTC-5, UTC-4 in summer
Emergency numberPolice 191, ambulance 1669, fire 199911
Elevation310 m2 m
Main airportChiang Mai International Airport (CNX)3 km from centre28 non-stop destinationsSt. Petersburg Clearwater International Airport (PIE)21 km from centre60 non-stop destinations
Public holidays this year-11 days

By the numbers

MeasureChiang MaiSt. Pete Beach
City population1,198,0008,879
People per km²2,958173
Museums within 10 km62
UNESCO World Heritage sites within 50 km00
Swim season, months above 21 °C-8 months

Where else could you go?

Every comparison below shares a destination with this one, so you can follow Chiang Mai or St. Pete Beach 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. Sea surface temperature from NOAA OISST v2.1, NOAA Physical Sciences Laboratory. 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 2026-11-02. Daily budgets are estimates from country price levels.