VacationSelector
Durban
A painted funicular on the hillside, Valparaiso
ValparaisoA painted funicular on the hillside

Photos: Valparaiso by Maclemo, CC BY-SA 3.0, cropped.

Durban or Valparaiso?

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
  • families
  • shopping

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

Choose Valparaiso for

  • day trips
  • culture and sights
  • getting around

What lies behind each score is written up on Valparaiso’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, Valparaiso 36: Durban leads by 44 points.
Food & drink. Durban 60, Valparaiso 50: Durban leads by 10 points.
Culture & sights. Durban 38, Valparaiso 62: Valparaiso leads by 24 points.
Nightlife. Durban 40, Valparaiso 56: Valparaiso leads by 16 points.
Nature & outdoors. Durban 68, Valparaiso 60: Durban leads by 8 points.
Day trips. Durban 38, Valparaiso 63: Valparaiso leads by 25 points.
Good for families. Durban 60, Valparaiso 33: Durban leads by 27 points.
Getting around. Durban 20, Valparaiso 44: Valparaiso leads by 24 points.
Shopping & style. Durban 42, Valparaiso 30: Durban leads by 12 points.
Affordability. Durban 72, Valparaiso 60: Durban leads by 12 points.
Live music & performing arts. Durban 40, Valparaiso 38: Durban leads by 2 points.
Wellness & relaxation. Durban 30, Valparaiso 18: Durban leads by 12 points.
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What lies behind each score is written up on the two cities’ own pages: Durban and Valparaiso.

Your match

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

Durban
Best match
49match

Wins on beaches and families with your weighting.

Valparaiso
46match

Wins on day trips and culture and sights 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

Valparaiso in July

15 °Cdaytime high
7 °Cnight-time low
71 mmrain in the month
No recordsunshine a day
13 °Csea
10 hdaylight a day

Daytime high, °C

0°10°20°30°JFMAMJJASOND

Rainfall in the month, mm

050100150JFMAMJJASOND
DurbanValparaiso

Where the figures come from

Valparaiso 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. Durban: 1991-2020 normals, Durban, Durban International Airport (14.1 km from centre). Valparaiso: 2010-2025 (rainfall 1991-2020) normals, Viña Del Mar / Montemar (17 km from centre).

Before you go

MeasureDurbanValparaiso
Official languageEnglish, Zulu, Xhosa, Afrikaans, Venda, Northern Sotho, Swazi, Tswana, Tsonga, Sesotho, Southern Ndebele, South African Sign LanguageSpanish
CurrencyRand (ZAR)Chilean Peso (CLP)
SocketsCMN230 V, 50 HzCL220 V, 50 Hz
Driving sideLeftRight
Time zoneUTC+2UTC-4, UTC-3 in summer
Emergency number112Police 133/134, ambulance 131, fire 132
Elevation22 m21 m
Main airportKing Shaka International Airport (DUR)29 km from centre13 non-stop destinationsComodoro Arturo Merino Benítez International Airport (SCL)87 km from centre67 non-stop destinations
Public holidays this year13 days16 days

By the numbers

MeasureDurbanValparaiso
City population595,061296,655
People per km²2,6346,180
Museums within 10 km117
UNESCO World Heritage sites within 50 km11
Swim season, months above 21 °C12 monthsNone

Where else could you go?

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