Como or Lyon?
Two destinations compared on nine measures of openly sourced data. Weight what matters to you and the verdict follows.
Your match
Wins on nature & day trips and value for money with your weighting.
Wins on places to eat and good for families with your weighting.
What matters to you?
Pick a travel style or drag the sliders. The match scores above update as you do.
The verdict
Choose Como if the trip is about the surroundings: protected countryside close at hand and UNESCO-listed places within day-trip reach, and you are content with a small centre and a short list of restaurants and bars.
Choose Lyon if you want the city itself to carry the trip: far more places to eat, more nightlife, more for children and more to see on foot, with drier summer months.
Scoreboard
Each measure scored 0 to 100. Open a row for the figures behind the score.
Beaches & swimming. Como and Lyon are level on 0.
| Como | Lyon | |
|---|---|---|
| Score | 0 | 0 |
| Swim season months | 0 | 0 |
| Beaches 10 km | 8 | 26 |
| Coast distance | 156 km | 253 km |
| Water distance | — | — |
Places to eat. Lyon leads by 54 points.54
| Como | Lyon | |
|---|---|---|
| Score | 25 | 79 |
| Restaurants within 2 km of centre | 259 | 1,691 |
| Effective number of cuisines within 2 km | 7 | 40 |
Museums & heritage. Lyon leads by 9 points.9
| Como | Lyon | |
|---|---|---|
| Score | 46 | 55 |
| Museums within 10 km | 9 | 53 |
| Museums within 2 km of centre | 6 | 25 |
| Share of museums within 2 km % | 67 | 47 |
| Unesco sites within 50 km | 8 | 2 |
Nightlife. Lyon leads by 34 points.34
| Como | Lyon | |
|---|---|---|
| Score | 24 | 58 |
| Drinking venues within 4 km | 213 | 866 |
| Drinking venues within 2 km of centre | 143 | 611 |
| Share of drinking venues within 2 km % | 67 | 71 |
| Nightclubs within 4 km | 1 | 47 |
Nature & day trips. Como leads by 7 points.7
| Como | Lyon | |
|---|---|---|
| Score | 40 | 33 |
| Protected land share 50 km % | 23 | 6 |
| Landscape blanket share 50 km % | 5 | 6 |
| Land share of disc % | 100 | 100 |
| Park area within 2 km | 15 hectares | 120 hectares |
Good for families. Lyon leads by 44 points.44
| Como | Lyon | |
|---|---|---|
| Score | 15 | 59 |
| Tourist attractions within 2 km | 6 | 25 |
| Park area within 2 km | 15 hectares | 120 hectares |
| Theme parks within 30 km | 0 | 2 |
Sights concentration. Lyon leads by 24 points.24
| Como | Lyon | |
|---|---|---|
| Score | 30 | 54 |
| Notable places within 2 km | 22 | 86 |
| Min wikipedia languages | 5 | 5 |
Value for money. Como leads by 6 points.6
| Como | Lyon | |
|---|---|---|
| Score | 68 | 62 |
| Price level global | 64.9 | 73.7 |
| Daily budget | €155 | €160 |
Year-round weather. Lyon leads by 6 points.6
| Como | Lyon | |
|---|---|---|
| Score | 58 | 64 |
| Monthly daytime high | 7.1 °C to 27.3 °C | 7 °C to 28 °C |
| Monthly rainfall | 61 mm to 178 mm | 43 mm to 101 mm |
| Dry months | 0 | 0 |
Where they differ
Como is the better base for getting out of town: 23% of the land around it is protected against 6% around Lyon, and 8 UNESCO-listed places sit within day-trip reach against Lyon's 2.
Lyon has many times as many restaurants near the centre and a far wider range of kitchens, many times as many bars and clubs, and about three times as many notable places within walking distance. Add much more park space and 2 theme parks within reach, where Como has none.
Where they are alike
Neither is a swimming destination. Lyon counts more beaches nearby than Como, but neither has a month with the water at 21°C or more, so bathing is incidental rather than a reason to go.
The weather runs on much the same track, roughly 7-27°C across the year in both, and neither gets a month down to 40mm of rain or less. The two national budget estimates behind them also sit close together, so cost is unlikely to decide this.
Which traveller are you?
If eating out is the point of the trip, take Lyon: many times as many restaurants near the centre and a far broader spread of kitchens, with the bars and clubs concentrated in the same walkable area.
Travelling with children, Lyon again: many times as many attractions and much more park space near the centre, plus 2 theme parks within reach, where Como has none.
For walking, landscape and heritage day trips, Como: 23% of the surrounding land is protected against 6% near Lyon, and 8 UNESCO-listed places lie within reach against 2. Its museums are fewer than Lyon's but sit tightly around the centre, so a day on foot covers them.
What the numbers don't tell you
The daily figures, €155 and €160, are national estimates of restaurant and hotel price levels, not measurements of either city. A heavily visited city can sit well above its own country average, and that gap can be larger than the difference between the two national estimates, so neither figure tells you which trip costs more.
Como's warmest months are also among its wettest, with 158-172mm through the summer, and neither city has a month at 40mm of rain or less. A strong high-summer rating here describes warmth, not dry days outdoors.
When should you go?
The figures behind each month. Each row is shaded against that destination's own year, so the deepest cell is its best month for that measure and the palest its weakest. Shades are not comparable between the two rows.
Temperature and rainfall are thirty-year climate normals, averaged over the years shown. Como: 1991-2020 normals, Lugano (23 km from centre). Lyon: 1991-2020 normals, Lyon / Bron (10.6 km from centre).
Como is at its best in July and August, when highs reach 27°C, though summer rain stays heavy at around 158mm a month, and May and June are wetter still at 172-178mm. February is the driest month at 61mm, but highs are only 9°C.
Lyon holds up across more of the year. June to August brings 26-28°C with 66-73mm of rain, clearly drier than Como at the same time, and May at 21°C and 82mm already works. October is the wettest month at 101mm.
Getting there
| Flying from | Como | Lyon |
|---|---|---|
| LondonLHR, LGW, STN, LTN +2 | 1 h 45 m €48-103 MXP · 34 km | 1 h 35 m no fares LYS · 20 km |
| ParisCDG, ORY, BVA | 1 h 20 m €46-63 MXP · 34 km | 1 h 10 m no fares LYS · 20 km |
| IstanbulIST, SAW | 2 h 40 m €140-309 MXP · 34 km | 3 h 0 m €167-217 LYS · 20 km |
| BarcelonaBCN | 1 h 30 m €34-53 MXP · 34 km | 1 h 20 m €70-92 LYS · 20 km |
| RomeFCO, CIA | 1 h 15 m €116-135 LIN · 43 km | 1 h 30 m €79-99 LYS · 20 km |
| MadridMAD | 2 h 0 m €63-91 MXP · 34 km | 1 h 45 m no fares LYS · 20 km |
| LisbonLIS | 2 h 35 m €78-142 MXP · 34 km | 2 h 20 m €109-165 LYS · 20 km |
| DubaiDXB, DWC | 6 h 10 m €375-563 MXP · 34 km | 6 h 30 m no fares LYS · 20 km |
| MontrealYUL, YHU, YMX | 7 h 50 m no fares MXP · 34 km | 7 h 35 m €446-565 1 stop LYS · 20 km |
| BeijingPEK, PKX | 10 h 10 m €710-815 1 stop MXP · 34 km | 10 h 20 m no fares GVA · 111 km |
The busiest departure cities for these two, with a place kept for each other part of the world. Busiest means arriving passengers where an official count exists, and where none does, the number of non-stop services flown: official route statistics are published by the European reporting countries and by nobody else, so a table ranked on them alone would offer a reader in New York or Tokyo ten European cities. Flying times are estimated from the distance between airports, and every row is a city flown non-stop to both. Where the typical offer connects anyway, the stops are shown. Under each figure is the airport the flight lands at and how far that is from the centre, because the nearest airport is not always the one a route is flown to. Where both columns name the same airport it is one flight, and the difference between the two is the distance printed beside it. Typical return fares for 2026-08 to 2026-10, cached market data up to 7 days old. The figure is the middle half of the offers found, so a single price means they agreed and a range means they did not; for a typical route that middle half spans about a quarter of the median, and for the least settled routes rather more than the median itself.
Before you go
| Measure | Como | Lyon |
|---|---|---|
| Official language | Italian | French |
| Currency | Euro (EUR) | Euro (EUR) |
| Sockets | CFL230 V, 50 Hz | CE230 V, 50 Hz |
| Driving side | Right | Right |
| Time zone | UTC+1, UTC+2 in summer | UTC+1, UTC+2 in summer |
| Emergency number | 112 | 112 |
| Elevation | 201 m | 160 m |
| Main airport | Milan Malpensa International Airport (MXP)34 km from centre203 non-stop destinations | Lyon Saint-Exupéry Airport (LYS)20 km from centre139 non-stop destinations |
| Public holidays this year | 13 days | 11 days |
By the numbers
| Measure | Como | Lyon |
|---|---|---|
| City population | 83,184 | 519,127 |
| People per km² | 2,242 | 10,838 |
| Museums within 10 km | 9 | 42 |
| UNESCO World Heritage sites within 50 km | 8 | 2 |
| Distinct cuisines in the centre | 22 | 148 |
Where else could you go?
Every comparison below shares a destination with this one, so you can follow Como or Lyon somewhere new.