VacationSelector
Durban
Turquoise water off Giftun Island, Hurghada
HurghadaTurquoise water off Giftun Island

Photos: Hurghada by Andrey Korchagin, CC BY-SA 2.0, cropped.

Durban or Hurghada?

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

  • live music and the arts
  • food and drink
  • culture and sights

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

Choose Hurghada for

  • wellness
  • prices
  • beaches

What lies behind each score is written up on Hurghada’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, Hurghada 84: Hurghada leads by 4 points.
Food & drink. Durban 60, Hurghada 34: Durban leads by 26 points.
Culture & sights. Durban 38, Hurghada 14: Durban leads by 24 points.
Nightlife. Durban and Hurghada are level on 40.
Nature & outdoors. Durban 68, Hurghada 72: Hurghada leads by 4 points.
Day trips. Durban 38, Hurghada 30: Durban leads by 8 points.
Good for families. Durban 60, Hurghada 62: Hurghada leads by 2 points.
Getting around. Durban 20, Hurghada 22: Hurghada leads by 2 points.
Shopping & style. Durban 42, Hurghada 24: Durban leads by 18 points.
Affordability. Durban 72, Hurghada 80: Hurghada leads by 8 points.
Live music & performing arts. Durban 40, Hurghada 10: Durban leads by 30 points.
Wellness & relaxation. Durban 30, Hurghada 44: Hurghada leads by 14 points.
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What lies behind each score is written up on the two cities’ own pages: Durban and Hurghada.

Your match

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

Durban
Best match
49match

Wins on live music and the arts and food and drink with your weighting.

Hurghada
43match

Wins on wellness and prices 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

Hurghada in July

37 °Cdaytime high
28 °Cnight-time low
0 mmrain in the month
No recordsunshine a day
28 °Csea
14 hdaylight a day

Daytime high, °C

0°10°20°30°40°JFMAMJJASOND

Rainfall in the month, mm

050100150JFMAMJJASOND
DurbanHurghada

Temperature and rainfall are climate normals, averaged over the years shown. Durban: 1991-2020 normals, Durban, Durban International Airport (14.1 km from centre). Hurghada: 1991-2020 normals, Hurguada (15.2 km from centre).

Before you go

MeasureDurbanHurghada
Official languageEnglish, Zulu, Xhosa, Afrikaans, Venda, Northern Sotho, Swazi, Tswana, Tsonga, Sesotho, Southern Ndebele, South African Sign LanguageArabic
CurrencyRand (ZAR)Egyptian Pound (EGP)
SocketsCMN230 V, 50 HzCF220 V, 50 Hz
Driving sideLeftRight
Time zoneUTC+2UTC+2, UTC+3 in summer
Emergency number112Police 122, ambulance 123, fire 180
Elevation22 m11 m
Main airportKing Shaka International Airport (DUR)29 km from centre13 non-stop destinationsHurghada International Airport (HRG)9 km from centre111 non-stop destinations
Public holidays this year13 days15 days

By the numbers

MeasureDurbanHurghada
City population595,061214,247
People per km²2,634-
Museums within 10 km11
UNESCO World Heritage sites within 50 km10
Swim season, months above 21 °C12 months12 months

Where else could you go?

Every comparison below shares a destination with this one, so you can follow Durban or Hurghada 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. 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.