Edinburgh or London?
Two destinations compared on nine measures of openly sourced data. Weight what matters to you and the verdict follows.
Your match
Wins on beaches & swimming with your weighting.
Wins on nightlife and sights concentration with your weighting.
What matters to you?
Pick a travel style or drag the sliders. The match scores above update as you do.
The verdict
Choose Edinburgh if you want a compact trip near the water: the coast is within reach, and its museums, bars and attractions cluster around the centre, so most of a day can be done on foot.
Choose London if eating and going out lead your plans: about three times as many restaurants near the centre, many times more bars and clubs, and warmer days, up to 24°C in summer.
Scoreboard
Each measure scored 0 to 100. Open a row for the figures behind the score.
Beaches & swimming. Edinburgh leads by 55 points.55
| Edinburgh | London | |
|---|---|---|
| Score | 55 | 0 |
| Swim season months | 0 | 0 |
| Beaches 10 km | 20 | 47 |
| Coast distance | 3 km | 43 km |
| Water distance | 3 km | — |
Places to eat. London leads by 18 points.18
| Edinburgh | London | |
|---|---|---|
| Score | 70 | 88 |
| Restaurants within 2 km of centre | 1,023 | 3,317 |
| Effective number of cuisines within 2 km | 35 | 40 |
Museums & heritage. London leads by 15 points.15
| Edinburgh | London | |
|---|---|---|
| Score | 57 | 72 |
| Museums within 10 km | 30 | 148 |
| Museums within 2 km of centre | 22 | 49 |
| Share of museums within 2 km % | 73 | 33 |
| Unesco sites within 50 km | 3 | 4 |
Nightlife. London leads by 31 points.31
| Edinburgh | London | |
|---|---|---|
| Score | 64 | 95 |
| Drinking venues within 4 km | 1,193 | 5,327 |
| Drinking venues within 2 km of centre | 884 | 2,443 |
| Share of drinking venues within 2 km % | 74 | 46 |
| Nightclubs within 4 km | 65 | 312 |
Nature & day trips. London leads by 5 points.5
| Edinburgh | London | |
|---|---|---|
| Score | 35 | 40 |
| Protected land share 50 km % | 2 | 16 |
| Landscape blanket share 50 km % | 1 | 14 |
| Land share of disc % | 85 | 97 |
| Park area within 2 km | 166 hectares | 84 hectares |
Good for families. London leads by 3 points.3
| Edinburgh | London | |
|---|---|---|
| Score | 72 | 75 |
| Tourist attractions within 2 km | 87 | 85 |
| Park area within 2 km | 166 hectares | 84 hectares |
| Theme parks within 30 km | 0 | 3 |
Sights concentration. London leads by 29 points.29
| Edinburgh | London | |
|---|---|---|
| Score | 60 | 89 |
| Notable places within 2 km | 126 | 649 |
| Min wikipedia languages | 5 | 5 |
Value for money. Edinburgh and London are level on 54.
| Edinburgh | London | |
|---|---|---|
| Score | 54 | 54 |
| Price level global | 84.9 | 84.9 |
| Daily budget | — | — |
Year-round weather. London leads by 12 points.12
| Edinburgh | London | |
|---|---|---|
| Score | 51 | 63 |
| Monthly daytime high | 6.6 °C to 18.8 °C | 8.2 °C to 23.8 °C |
| Monthly rainfall | 43 mm to 80 mm | 38 mm to 67 mm |
| Dry months | 0 | 1 |
Where they differ
Edinburgh is the city with sea in the picture: the water peaks at 14°C in August, cool but swimmable. Its bars, museums and attractions sit close together, and it keeps about twice as much park space near the centre.
London has many times as many bars and nightclubs, though only about half sit near the centre where nearly all of Edinburgh's do. It also has many times as many notable places within walking distance, many times as many museums, and about three times as many restaurants near the centre.
Where they are alike
Both work with children. Each has a comparable number of tourist attractions near the centre, and the split is in kind rather than quantity: London has 3 theme parks within reach, Edinburgh none, while Edinburgh answers with about twice as much park space close in and a coast.
Neither is primarily a countryside base, though both put UNESCO-listed places within day-trip reach, 4 from London and 3 from Edinburgh, and both keep usable green space inside the city.
Which traveller are you?
If your evenings decide the trip, London: many times more bars and clubs, and about three times as many restaurants near the centre, though only about half its nightlife sits centrally, so expect some travel.
Families can pick either. London adds 3 theme parks within reach; Edinburgh has as many attractions near the centre, twice the park space, and a coast where the sea reaches 14°C in August.
For museums and country beyond the city, London leads, with many times as many museums and far more of the land around it protected. Edinburgh's answer is compactness: its museums sit tightly around the centre.
What the numbers don't tell you
The beach figures need care. London counts 47 beaches nearby against Edinburgh's 20, but proximity on a map is not a swim: no sea temperature is recorded for London at all, and Edinburgh's own water peaks at 14°C in August. Treat both as cities where the coast is a walk, not a beach holiday.
Second, no cost comparison is possible. The value figure behind both cities is a national price level, identical for the two by construction, and this dataset carries no daily budget for either. It says nothing about which trip will cost you more, and neither city can be called the cheaper one.
When should you go?
The figures behind each month. Each row is shaded against that destination's own year, so the deepest cell is its best month for that measure and the palest its weakest. Shades are not comparable between the two rows.
Temperature and rainfall are thirty-year climate normals, averaged over the years shown. Edinburgh: 1991-2020 normals, Edinburgh Airport (10 km from centre). London: 1991-2020 normals, London Heathrow Airport (22.5 km from centre).
Edinburgh's window is June to August, with highs of 17-19°C and sea at 12-14°C, though rain runs 63-69mm through those months. May is drier at 49mm and still mild enough for walking.
London is warmer and a little drier over the same stretch: May to September brings 18-24°C with rain near 46-53mm, and March, at 38mm, is the driest month either city offers. Winter is cool and wet in both, with little to separate them.
Getting there
| Flying from | Edinburgh | London |
|---|---|---|
| PalmaPMI | 2 h 55 m no fares EDI · 11 km | 2 h 10 m €79-116 LGW · 40 km |
| KerkyraCFU | 3 h 35 m no fares EDI · 11 km | 3 h 0 m no fares LGW · 40 km |
| MalagaAGP | 3 h 10 m no fares EDI · 11 km | 2 h 35 m €119-292 1 stop LGW · 40 km |
| AntalyaAYT | 4 h 35 m €195-238 2 stops EDI · 11 km | 4 h 5 m €144-189 LGW · 40 km |
| MilanMXP, BGY, LIN | 2 h 20 m €75-101 1 stop EDI · 11 km | 1 h 45 m €83-138 LGW · 40 km |
| AlicanteALC | 3 h 0 m €106 EDI · 11 km | 2 h 20 m €66-100 LGW · 40 km |
| TenerifeTFS, TFN | 4 h 30 m no fares EDI · 11 km | 4 h 5 m no fares LGW · 40 km |
| New YorkJFK, EWR, LGA | 6 h 50 m no fares EDI · 11 km | 7 h 10 m €518-651 1 stop LHR · 23 km |
| MarrakechRAK | 3 h 55 m no fares EDI · 11 km | 3 h 20 m €128-183 1 stop LGW · 40 km |
| CancunCUN | 9 h 40 m no fares GLA · 78 km | 10 h 5 m no fares LGW · 40 km |
The busiest departure cities for these two, with a place kept for each other part of the world. Busiest means arriving passengers where an official count exists, and where none does, the number of non-stop services flown: official route statistics are published by the European reporting countries and by nobody else, so a table ranked on them alone would offer a reader in New York or Tokyo ten European cities. Flying times are estimated from the distance between airports, and every row is a city flown non-stop to both. Where the typical offer connects anyway, the stops are shown. Under each figure is the airport the flight lands at and how far that is from the centre, because the nearest airport is not always the one a route is flown to. Where both columns name the same airport it is one flight, and the difference between the two is the distance printed beside it. Typical return fares for 2026-09 to 2026-10, cached market data up to 7 days old. The figure is the middle half of the offers found, so a single price means they agreed and a range means they did not; for a typical route that middle half spans about a quarter of the median, and for the least settled routes rather more than the median itself.
Before you go
| Measure | Edinburgh | London |
|---|---|---|
| Official language | English | English |
| Currency | Pound Sterling (GBP) | Pound Sterling (GBP) |
| Sockets | G230 V, 50 Hz | G230 V, 50 Hz |
| Driving side | Left | Left |
| Time zone | UTC, UTC+1 in summer | UTC, UTC+1 in summer |
| Emergency number | 112 or 999 | 112 or 999 |
| Elevation | 47 m | 4 m |
| Main airport | Edinburgh Airport (EDI)11 km from centre158 non-stop destinations | London Heathrow Airport (LHR)23 km from centre220 non-stop destinations |
| Public holidays this year | 10 days | 8 days |
By the numbers
| Measure | Edinburgh | London |
|---|---|---|
| City population | 488,050 | 8,799,728 |
| People per km² | 1,884 | 5,598 |
| Museums within 10 km | 32 | 215 |
| UNESCO World Heritage sites within 50 km | 3 | 4 |
| Distinct cuisines in the centre | 78 | 116 |
| Swim season, months above 21 °C | None | – |
Where else could you go?
Every comparison below shares a destination with this one, so you can follow Edinburgh or London somewhere new.