Daytona Beach or Naples, Florida?

Both are true beach towns, but the water is different. Daytona Beach faces the Atlantic, with a huge 37km sweep of hard-packed sand where cars can drive on marked stretches, greenish water, steady waves and rip currents that keep swimmers near the lifeguards. Quieter sand lies at Ormond Beach and Ponce Inlet, and New Smyrna Beach draws surfers.

Naples comes out ahead for swimming. Its pale, fine Gulf sand meets shallow, clear and usually calm water, the sun sets over the sea, and wilder stretches at Clam Pass, Delnor-Wiggins and Barefoot Beach add variety. Shuffle your feet for stingrays and expect the odd algae bloom.

Neither is a destination for food, but Naples eats better. Its dining is concentrated on Fifth Avenue South and Third Street South, with terraces, wine bars and white-tablecloth rooms, plus stone crab in the cooler months at the fish houses around Tin City.

Daytona Beach is more casual: fried shrimp and smoked fish dip on decks over the Halifax River and towards Ponce Inlet, Southern breakfasts, and a lot of chains along the main roads. It is cheaper and more relaxed, but the choice is thinner.

Both towns are thin on sights and can be seen in a day or two, and oddly both lean on cars. Daytona Beach has the living version: the Speedway and the speed records once set on its sand, along with the Museum of Arts and Sciences and its Cuban art, and the climb up Florida's tallest lighthouse at Ponce Inlet.

Naples offers the quieter, more curated version, with historic racing cars at the Revs Institute, modern and American art at the Baker Museum, and the handsome Mediterranean-style streets of Old Naples around Palm Cottage.

Daytona Beach is the livelier of the two by some way. Main Street's biker saloons, sports bars and beach bars give it a rowdy, beer-and-motorcycles character that peaks during Bike Week, Biketoberfest and race weeks, though dancing and cocktail bars are scarce.

Naples is built for an early night. A sunset drink at a tiki bar, then a wine bar or piano lounge on Fifth Avenue South, is the usual evening, the crowd is older, and in summer the town is nearly silent before midnight.

Naples has the stronger wild country on its doorstep. Within an hour lie Big Cypress, the western Everglades, the boardwalk at Corkscrew Swamp and the Fakahatchee Strand, and paddling the mangrove channels of the Ten Thousand Islands and Rookery Bay is the best outing either city offers.

Daytona Beach is no poor relation: Canaveral National Seashore and the Mosquito Lagoon are good for kayaking among dolphins, Merritt Island is excellent for birds, and Blue Spring draws manatees in winter. It also has the surf near Ponce Inlet, which the calmer Gulf lacks.

Daytona Beach is much better placed for outings. St Augustine's Spanish fort and old streets are about an hour north, Kennedy Space Center a little over an hour south, and Orlando's theme parks and lakeside Winter Park an hour inland, so a week can mix beach days with very different experiences.

From Naples the choices are gentler: the Edison and Ford Winter Estates in Fort Myers, the shelling islands of Sanibel and Captiva, and Everglades City. Sarasota and Miami are each about two hours away, which makes for a long day.

Both work well for children, in different ways. Daytona Beach offers the boardwalk's arcades and rides, a water park and the Orlando parks an hour away, but the surf and rip currents need watching, and spring break and Bike Week are best avoided.

Naples is the calmer choice for young children, with shallow, gentle water, dolphins seen from the shore, Naples Zoo and a children's museum. The trade-off is that Orlando is well over three hours away, so theme park days are not practical.

Both are car towns with thin bus services, and every day trip needs a hire car. In Daytona Beach the hard sand itself is the best walking and cycling route, but away from the boardwalk the town spreads along wide roads that jam during big events.

Naples differs mainly in where you can manage without a car. The compact grid of Old Naples lets you walk or cycle between the pier, the beach and the restaurants, so a stay there needs the car only for outings.

Naples is the place for shopping, though even there the range is narrow. Fifth Avenue South and Third Street South mix galleries, jewellers and resort-wear boutiques under palms, and an open-air mall gathers the designer labels.

Daytona Beach is purely practical: an outlet centre, a regional mall, beach shops for towels and swimwear, and Main Street's motorcycle gear, with a few independent galleries on Beach Street.

Daytona Beach is clearly the cheaper vacation. Older oceanfront motels and condo rentals keep rooms affordable by American standards, and diners and fish camps keep meals modest, as long as you avoid the Daytona 500 and Bike Week, when rates jump.

Naples is priced for a wealthy clientele, with the steepest rates from January to April and expensive sit-down dinners. Summer is much cheaper but hot and stormy, and staying inland or in Fort Myers is the usual way to cut costs.

Naples has the fuller winter calendar, centred on its arts campus where the Naples Philharmonic plays in its own hall, alongside a professional theatre company, touring Broadway shows and jazz nights in restaurants.

Daytona Beach relies on visiting orchestras in its winter series and touring shows at the Peabody Auditorium, with no orchestra of its own. In summer, though, its free concerts at the oceanfront bandshell give it more going on than Naples, whose programme almost stops.

Neither has a bathing tradition, but Naples is far more restful. Its big beachfront resort spas are open to non-guests, golf is everywhere, and the whole town moves slowly.

Daytona Beach offers resort spas and day spas on a smaller scale, and its calm comes from early walks on the hard sand and afternoons by a condo pool. Choose your dates carefully, because race weeks and Bike Week bring a lot of noise.