VacationSelector
The Plaza de Armas with the cathedral and La Compañía, Cusco
CuscoThe Plaza de Armas with the cathedral and La Compañía
Seven Mile Beach, Negril
NegrilSeven Mile Beach

Photos: Cusco by Pedro Szekely, CC BY-SA 2.0, cropped; Negril by gustavo.kunst, CC BY-SA 3.0, cropped.

Cusco or Negril?

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 Cusco for

  • culture and sights
  • day trips
  • shopping

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

Choose Negril for

  • beaches
  • families
  • wellness

What lies behind each score is written up on Negril’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. Cusco 3, Negril 93: Negril leads by 90 points.
Food & drink. Cusco 56, Negril 36: Cusco leads by 20 points.
Culture & sights. Cusco 81, Negril 8: Cusco leads by 73 points.
Nightlife. Cusco 42, Negril 40: Cusco leads by 2 points.
Nature & outdoors. Cusco 86, Negril 60: Cusco leads by 26 points.
Day trips. Cusco 78, Negril 35: Cusco leads by 43 points.
Good for families. Cusco 10, Negril 45: Negril leads by 35 points.
Getting around. Cusco 48, Negril 30: Cusco leads by 18 points.
Shopping & style. Cusco 52, Negril 15: Cusco leads by 37 points.
Affordability. Cusco 73, Negril 44: Cusco leads by 29 points.
Live music & performing arts. Cusco 30, Negril 33: Negril leads by 3 points.
Wellness & relaxation. Cusco 33, Negril 52: Negril leads by 19 points.
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What lies behind each score is written up on the two cities’ own pages: Cusco and Negril.

Your match

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

Cusco
Best match
49match

Wins on culture and sights and day trips with your weighting.

Negril
41match

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.

Cusco in July

20 °Cdaytime high
1 °Cnight-time low
5 mmrain in the month
No recordsunshine a day
No seasea
11 hdaylight a day

Negril in July

34 °Cdaytime high
25 °Cnight-time low
174 mmrain in the month
9 hsunshine a day
29 °Csea
13 hdaylight a day

Daytime high, °C

0°10°20°30°40°JFMAMJJASOND

Rainfall in the month, mm

050100150200250JFMAMJJASOND
CuscoNegril

Where the figures come from

Cusco's station stands 151 m below the city centre, so the centre is likely a little cooler than the figures say.

Negril's temperatures are measured 52 km from the centre, at Montego Bay / Sangster.

Negril 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. Cusco: 1991-2020 normals, Cuzco (3.7 km from centre). Negril: 1991-2020 normals, Montego Bay / Sangster (51.8 km from centre).

Before you go

MeasureCuscoNegril
Official languageSpanish, Aymara, QuechuaEnglish, Jamaican Patois
CurrencySol (PEN)Jamaican Dollar (JMD)
SocketsABC220 V, 60 HzAB116 V, 50 Hz
Driving sideRightLeft
Time zoneUTC-5UTC-5
Emergency number111 or 911Police 110/112/119/911, ambulance 110, fire 110
Elevation3,399 m10 m
Main airportAlejandro Velasco Astete International Airport (CUZ)5 km from centre6 non-stop destinationsSangster International Airport (MBJ)52 km from centre48 non-stop destinations
Public holidays this year16 days10 days

By the numbers

MeasureCuscoNegril
City population428,4504,500
Museums within 10 km110
UNESCO World Heritage sites within 50 km20
Swim season, months above 21 °C-12 months

Where else could you go?

Every comparison below shares a destination with this one, so you can follow Cusco or Negril 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). 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. Daylight hours computed from each destination's latitude using the NOAA solar position algorithm. Exchange rates via Frankfurter, based on European Central Bank reference rates.

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.