VacationSelector
The cathedral and Great St. Martin on the Rhine, Cologne
CologneThe cathedral and Great St. Martin on the Rhine
The 1933 courthouse in downtown Fort Myers, now an arts centre, Fort Myers
Fort MyersThe 1933 courthouse in downtown Fort Myers, now an arts centre

Photos: Cologne by Jörg Braukmann, CC BY-SA 4.0, cropped; Fort Myers by Ebyabe, CC BY-SA 3.0, cropped.

Cologne or Fort Myers?

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 Cologne for

  • getting around
  • culture and sights
  • nightlife

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

Choose Fort Myers for

  • beaches
  • nature and the outdoors

What lies behind each score is written up on Fort Myers’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. Cologne 14, Fort Myers 77: Fort Myers leads by 63 points.
Food & drink. Cologne 52, Fort Myers 40: Cologne leads by 12 points.
Culture & sights. Cologne 67, Fort Myers 32: Cologne leads by 35 points.
Nightlife. Cologne 66, Fort Myers 32: Cologne leads by 34 points.
Nature & outdoors. Cologne 56, Fort Myers 63: Fort Myers leads by 7 points.
Day trips. Cologne 80, Fort Myers 50: Cologne leads by 30 points.
Good for families. Cologne 70, Fort Myers 62: Cologne leads by 8 points.
Getting around. Cologne 74, Fort Myers 15: Cologne leads by 59 points.
Shopping & style. Cologne 57, Fort Myers 38: Cologne leads by 19 points.
Affordability. Cologne 46, Fort Myers 38: Cologne leads by 8 points.
Live music & performing arts. Cologne 68, Fort Myers 36: Cologne leads by 32 points.
Wellness & relaxation. Cologne 50, Fort Myers 35: Cologne leads by 15 points.
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What lies behind each score is written up on the two cities’ own pages: Cologne and Fort Myers.

Your match

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

Cologne
Best match
58match

Wins on getting around and culture and sights with your weighting.

Fort Myers
43match

Wins on beaches 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.

Cologne in July

25 °Cdaytime high
16 °Cnight-time low
81 mmrain in the month
7 hsunshine a day
No seasea
16 hdaylight a day

Fort Myers in July

33 °Cdaytime high
24 °Cnight-time low
220 mmrain in the month
No recordsunshine a day
30 °Csea
14 hdaylight a day

Daytime high, °C

0°10°20°30°40°JFMAMJJASOND

Rainfall in the month, mm

050100150200250JFMAMJJASOND
CologneFort Myers

Where the figures come from

Fort Myers 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. Cologne: 1991-2020 normals, Köln-Stammheim (5.4 km from centre). Fort Myers: 1991-2020 normals, Fort Myers / Page Park (4.5 km from centre).

Before you go

MeasureCologneFort Myers
Official languageGerman-
CurrencyEuro (EUR)US Dollar (USD)
SocketsCF230 V, 50 HzAB120 V, 60 Hz
Driving sideRightRight
Time zoneUTC+1, UTC+2 in summerUTC-5, UTC-4 in summer
Emergency number112911
Elevation59 m3 m
Main airportCologne Bonn Airport (CGN)15 km from centre115 non-stop destinationsSouthwest Florida International Airport (RSW)12 km from centre79 non-stop destinations
Public holidays this year11 days11 days

By the numbers

MeasureCologneFort Myers
City population1,025,52386,395
People per km²2,532681
Museums within 10 km403
UNESCO World Heritage sites within 50 km30
Swim season, months above 21 °C-10 months

Where else could you go?

Every comparison below shares a destination with this one, so you can follow Cologne or Fort Myers 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). Tourism statistics from Eurostat, © European Union, reused under CC BY 4.0. Public holidays from Nager.Date (MIT). 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. Exchange rates via Frankfurter, based on European Central Bank reference rates. 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.