VacationSelector

Copenhagen or Amsterdam?

Two destinations compared on nine measures of openly sourced data. Weight what matters to you and the verdict follows.

Your match

Too close to call, 2 points apart

Copenhagen
63
match

Wins on beaches & swimming and sights concentration with your weighting.

Amsterdam
65
match

Wins on places to eat and nature & day trips 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 Amsterdam if the wider choice of restaurants and kitchens matters, along with more museums and open country within reach, and if you want a spring that warms earlier, from March.

Choose Copenhagen if you want the sea 1km from the centre, more park space near the centre and a drier high summer, with July the strongest month of its year.

Scoreboard

Each measure scored 0 to 100. Open a row for the figures behind the score.

CopenhagenAmsterdam
Beaches & swimming. Copenhagen leads by 14 points.14
CopenhagenAmsterdam
Score5440
Swim season months00
Beaches 10 km1733
Coast distance1 km24 km
Water distance1 km24 km
Places to eat. Amsterdam leads by 10 points.10
CopenhagenAmsterdam
Score7383
Restaurants within 2 km of centre1,1831,957
Effective number of cuisines within 2 km3744
Museums & heritage. Amsterdam leads by 5 points.5
CopenhagenAmsterdam
Score7580
Museums within 10 km8398
Museums within 2 km of centre5169
Share of museums within 2 km %6170
Unesco sites within 50 km55
Nightlife. Amsterdam leads by 3 points.3
CopenhagenAmsterdam
Score6770
Drinking venues within 4 km1,3841,543
Drinking venues within 2 km of centre8061,078
Share of drinking venues within 2 km %5870
Nightclubs within 4 km64114
Nature & day trips. Amsterdam leads by 10 points.10
CopenhagenAmsterdam
Score5060
Protected land share 50 km %521
Landscape blanket share 50 km %00
Land share of disc %3982
Park area within 2 km138 hectares49 hectares
Good for families. Copenhagen leads by 3 points.3
CopenhagenAmsterdam
Score7168
Tourist attractions within 2 km5474
Park area within 2 km138 hectares49 hectares
Theme parks within 30 km23
Sights concentration. Copenhagen leads by 6 points.6
CopenhagenAmsterdam
Score7468
Notable places within 2 km273196
Min wikipedia languages55
Value for money. Amsterdam leads by 6 points.6
CopenhagenAmsterdam
Score5258
Price level global87.879.2
Daily budget€214€181
Year-round weather. Amsterdam leads by 2 points.2
CopenhagenAmsterdam
Score5557
Monthly daytime high3.6 °C to 22.7 °C6.1 °C to 23.1 °C
Monthly rainfall28 mm to 74 mm42 mm to 85 mm
Dry months30
0255075100

Where they differ

Amsterdam has roughly twice as many restaurants near the centre and a wider range of kitchens. It also has the better hinterland: 21% of the land around the city is protected against 5% around Copenhagen.

Copenhagen puts the sea 1km from the centre, where Amsterdam's is 24km out, and has about three times as much park space near the centre. Amsterdam has more beaches nearby, 33 of them, but reaching them means a trip.

Where they are alike

Their weather years run close together. Amsterdam is a touch milder, 6-23°C across the year against 4-23°C, but both peak in July, both bottom out in January, and neither offers a warm winter.

Nights out and family days look similar too: much the same number of places to drink in each, though Amsterdam's cluster more tightly around the centre. Both have theme parks within reach and plenty for children near the centre, whether that is attractions or parks.

Which traveller are you?

For a food-and-museums break, Amsterdam. It has about twice as many restaurants near the centre, a wider range of kitchens and more museums, though both cities have 5 UNESCO-listed places within day-trip reach.

For a short walking-based break with children, Copenhagen. More notable places sit within walking distance of the centre, park space near the centre is roughly three times Amsterdam's, and the sea is 1km away.

For anyone planning to get out of the city, Amsterdam. Protected land covers 21% of its surroundings against 5% around Copenhagen, and it has the wider choice of theme parks within reach.

What the numbers don't tell you

The daily budget figures, €181 and €214, are national price levels for restaurants and hotels in each country, not measurements of either city. A capital or a heavily visited city can sit well away from its own national average, by more than the gap between these two figures, so nothing here tells you which city costs more on the ground.

No weather station near Copenhagen reports sunshine hours, so that series is missing rather than low, and its monthly picture rests on temperature, rainfall and sea temperature alone. Easy beach access is also not warm water: neither city sees a month of sea at 21°C or more.

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.

J
F
M
A
M
J
J
A
S
O
N
D
Daytime high, °C
Copenhagen
4
4
7
12
17
20
23
22
18
13
8
5
Amsterdam
6
7
11
15
18
21
23
23
20
15
10
7
Sea temperature, °C
Copenhagen
3
2
3
6
10
14
17
18
15
12
9
5
Amsterdam
6
5
6
8
12
15
17
19
17
15
11
8
Rainfall, mm
Copenhagen
44
32
30
28
47
60
59
74
59
61
49
47
Amsterdam
71
63
58
42
59
71
85
84
78
81
80
84
Daylight, hours per day
Copenhagen
8
10
12
14
16
17
17
15
13
11
8
7
Amsterdam
8
10
12
14
16
17
16
15
13
11
9
8
Sunshine, hours per day
Copenhagen
No sunshine record
Amsterdam
2
3
5
6
7
7
7
6
5
4
2
2

Temperature and rainfall are thirty-year climate normals, averaged over the years shown. Copenhagen: 1991-2020 normals, Koebenhavn / Landbohoejskolen (2.4 km from centre). Amsterdam: 1991-2020 normals, De Bilt (35.3 km from centre).

WorseBetter

Amsterdam warms earlier in the year: highs of 11°C in March against 7°C, and 15°C in April against 12°C, so the walking season opens sooner and the spring shoulder is the time to take it.

Copenhagen is the better bet at the peak. Both top out at 23°C in July, but Copenhagen's high-summer rain runs 59-74mm a month against Amsterdam's 84-85mm, and its spring months stay at 40mm or less, which Amsterdam never manages.

Getting there

Flying fromCopenhagenAmsterdam
LondonLHR, LGW, STN, LTN +2
1 h 50 m
€55-95
CPH · 8 km
1 h 5 m
€93-112
AMS · 12 km
StockholmARN, BMA, NYO, VST
1 h 20 m
€90-98
1 stop
CPH · 8 km
2 h 0 m
€156-208
AMS · 12 km
OsloOSL, TRF
1 h 15 m
no fares
CPH · 8 km
1 h 50 m
€155-209
1 stop
AMS · 12 km
ParisCDG, ORY, BVA
1 h 50 m
€70-135
CPH · 8 km
1 h 10 m
€178-300
AMS · 12 km
IstanbulIST, SAW
3 h 0 m
€195-237
CPH · 8 km
3 h 15 m
€166-175
AMS · 12 km
BarcelonaBCN
2 h 45 m
€94-138
1 stop
CPH · 8 km
2 h 10 m
€130-171
AMS · 12 km
MilanMXP, BGY, LIN
2 h 0 m
€78-118
CPH · 8 km
1 h 35 m
€106-155
AMS · 12 km
New YorkJFK, EWR, LGA
7 h 55 m
€460-501
1 stop
CPH · 8 km
7 h 35 m
€512-556
1 stop
AMS · 12 km
DubaiDXB, DWC
6 h 20 m
€338-366
1 stop
CPH · 8 km
6 h 45 m
€318-346
1 stop
AMS · 12 km
BangkokBKK, DMK
10 h 50 m
no fares
CPH · 8 km
11 h 30 m
no fares
AMS · 12 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

MeasureCopenhagenAmsterdam
Official languageDanishDutch
CurrencyDanish Krone (DKK)Euro (EUR)
SocketsCEFK230 V, 50 HzCF230 V, 50 Hz
Driving sideRightRight
Time zoneUTC+1, UTC+2 in summerUTC+1, UTC+2 in summer
Emergency number112112 or 911
Elevation14 m-2 m
Main airportCopenhagen Kastrup Airport (CPH)8 km from centre144 non-stop destinationsAmsterdam Airport Schiphol (AMS)12 km from centre287 non-stop destinations
Public holidays this year14 days11 days

By the numbers

MeasureCopenhagenAmsterdam
City population667,099921,468
People per km²7,3394,208
Museums within 10 km72101
UNESCO World Heritage sites within 50 km55
Distinct cuisines in the centre8298
Swim season, months above 21 °CNoneNone

Where else could you go?

Every comparison below shares a destination with this one, so you can follow Copenhagen or Amsterdam somewhere new.

Browse every destination we have measured

Sources

© OpenStreetMap contributors, data available under the Open Database Licence. Place counts include data from Overture Maps Foundation (CDLA Permissive 2.0), assembled from Meta, Microsoft, Foursquare and other providers. Notable-place counts from Wikidata (CC0), weighted by Wikipedia language editions. Structured data from Wikidata (CC0). Weather data by Meteostat. Meteorological data provided by NOAA, DWD and others. Sea surface temperature from NOAA OISST v2.1, NOAA Physical Sciences Laboratory. Airport data from OurAirports (public domain). Tourism statistics from Eurostat, © European Union, reused under CC BY 4.0. Public holidays from Nager.Date (MIT). 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. Daylight hours computed from each destination's latitude using the NOAA solar position algorithm. Typical fares from Travelpayouts (Aviasales data). Route-level air passenger statistics from Eurostat, © European Union, reused under CC BY 4.0.

Scores follow rubric v2; snapshot generated 2026-09-01. Typical prices can be up to 7 days old. Daily budgets are estimates from country price levels.