VacationSelector
Durban
Florence and the Arno, Florence
FlorenceFlorence and the Arno

Photos: Florence by Wolfgang Weiser, Pexels License.

Durban or Florence?

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 Durban for

  • beaches
  • prices
  • families

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

Choose Florence for

  • day trips
  • getting around
  • culture and sights

What lies behind each score is written up on Florence’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. Durban 80, Florence 14: Durban leads by 66 points.
Food & drink. Durban 60, Florence 74: Florence leads by 14 points.
Culture & sights. Durban 38, Florence 94: Florence leads by 56 points.
Nightlife. Durban 40, Florence 42: Florence leads by 2 points.
Nature & outdoors. Durban 68, Florence 58: Durban leads by 10 points.
Day trips. Durban 38, Florence 98: Florence leads by 60 points.
Good for families. Durban 60, Florence 45: Durban leads by 15 points.
Getting around. Durban 20, Florence 78: Florence leads by 58 points.
Shopping & style. Durban 42, Florence 72: Florence leads by 30 points.
Affordability. Durban 72, Florence 35: Durban leads by 37 points.
Live music & performing arts. Durban 40, Florence 58: Florence leads by 18 points.
Wellness & relaxation. Durban 30, Florence 42: Florence leads by 12 points.
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What lies behind each score is written up on the two cities’ own pages: Durban and Florence.

Your match

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

Durban
49match

Wins on beaches and prices with your weighting.

Florence
Best match
59match

Wins on day trips and getting around with your weighting.

What matters to you?

When should you go?

Pick your month. The climate figures are measured averages, not a forecast.

Durban in July

23 °Cdaytime high
11 °Cnight-time low
44 mmrain in the month
8 hsunshine a day
22 °Csea
10 hdaylight a day

Florence in July

32 °Cdaytime high
19 °Cnight-time low
37 mmrain in the month
11 hsunshine a day
No seasea
15 hdaylight a day

Daytime high, °C

0°10°20°30°40°JFMAMJJASOND

Rainfall in the month, mm

050100150JFMAMJJASOND
DurbanFlorence

Where the figures come from

Florence 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.

Florence's sunshine is measured 71 km from the centre, at Pisa / S. Giusto.

Temperature and rainfall are climate normals, averaged over the years shown. Durban: 1991-2020 normals, Durban, Durban International Airport (14.1 km from centre). Florence: 1995-2020 (sunshine 1991-2020, rainfall 1991-2020) normals, Firenze / Peretola (5.6 km from centre).

Before you go

MeasureDurbanFlorence
Official languageEnglish, Zulu, Xhosa, Afrikaans, Venda, Northern Sotho, Swazi, Tswana, Tsonga, Sesotho, Southern Ndebele, South African Sign LanguageItalian
CurrencyRand (ZAR)Euro (EUR)
SocketsCMN230 V, 50 HzCFL230 V, 50 Hz
Driving sideLeftRight
Time zoneUTC+2UTC+1, UTC+2 in summer
Emergency number112112
Elevation22 m50 m
Main airportKing Shaka International Airport (DUR)29 km from centre13 non-stop destinationsFlorence Airport, Peretola (FLR)6 km from centre46 non-stop destinations
Public holidays this year13 days13 days

By the numbers

MeasureDurbanFlorence
City population595,061360,930
People per km²2,6343,528
Museums within 10 km1141
UNESCO World Heritage sites within 50 km14
Swim season, months above 21 °C12 months-

Where else could you go?

Every comparison below shares a destination with this one, so you can follow Durban or Florence 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. Sea surface temperature from NOAA OISST v2.1, NOAA Physical Sciences Laboratory. Airport data from OurAirports (public domain). 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. Tourism statistics from Eurostat, © European Union, reused under CC BY 4.0. 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.