VacationSelector
The entrance to the Big Lagoon, El Nido
El NidoThe entrance to the Big Lagoon
The tusks over Moi Avenue, Mombasa
MombasaThe tusks over Moi Avenue

Photos: El Nido by nennnn, CC BY 2.0, cropped; Mombasa by Rob Oo, CC BY 2.0, cropped.

El Nido or Mombasa?

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 El Nido for

  • nature and the outdoors
  • beaches
  • wellness

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

Choose Mombasa for

  • culture and sights
  • day trips
  • food and drink

What lies behind each score is written up on Mombasa’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. El Nido 92, Mombasa 82: El Nido leads by 10 points.
Food & drink. El Nido 27, Mombasa 60: Mombasa leads by 33 points.
Culture & sights. El Nido 4, Mombasa 55: Mombasa leads by 51 points.
Nightlife. El Nido 30, Mombasa 46: Mombasa leads by 16 points.
Nature & outdoors. El Nido 87, Mombasa 74: El Nido leads by 13 points.
Day trips. El Nido 8, Mombasa 45: Mombasa leads by 37 points.
Good for families. El Nido 40, Mombasa 45: Mombasa leads by 5 points.
Getting around. El Nido 22, Mombasa 30: Mombasa leads by 8 points.
Shopping & style. El Nido 7, Mombasa 35: Mombasa leads by 28 points.
Affordability. El Nido 64, Mombasa 70: Mombasa leads by 6 points.
Live music & performing arts. El Nido 7, Mombasa 22: Mombasa leads by 15 points.
Wellness & relaxation. El Nido 46, Mombasa 40: El Nido leads by 6 points.
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What lies behind each score is written up on the two cities’ own pages: El Nido and Mombasa.

Your match

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

El Nido
36match

Wins on nature and the outdoors and beaches with your weighting.

Mombasa
Best match
50match

Wins on culture and sights and day trips with your weighting.

What matters to you?

When should you go?

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

El Nido in July

29 °Cdaytime high
27 °Cnight-time low
368 mmrain in the month
29 °Csea
13 hdaylight a day

Mombasa in July

28 °Cdaytime high
20 °Cnight-time low
63 mmrain in the month
26 °Csea
12 hdaylight a day

Daytime high, °C

0°10°20°30°40°JFMAMJJASOND

Rainfall in the month, mm

0100200300400JFMAMJJASOND
El NidoMombasa

Where the figures come from

El Nido has no weather station within reach, so its figures come from a gridded climate model rather than a measured record, and read a broad area rather than the city itself.

Mombasa 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. El Nido: 2001-2020 normals, NASA POWER reanalysis grid, no weather station within 90 km. Mombasa: 1991-2020 normals, Mombasa (5.8 km from centre).

Before you go

MeasureEl NidoMombasa
Official languageEnglish, Filipino, TaglishEnglish, Swahili
CurrencyPhilippine Peso (PHP)Kenyan Shilling (KES)
SocketsABC220 V, 60 HzG240 V, 50 Hz
Driving sideRightLeft
Time zoneUTC+8UTC+3
Emergency number911Police 112/999, ambulance 112/999, fire 112/999
Elevation35 m50 m
Main airportEl Nido Airport (ENI)4 km from centre5 non-stop destinationsMoi International Airport (MBA)8 km from centre22 non-stop destinations
Public holidays this year18 days10 days

By the numbers

MeasureEl NidoMombasa
City population51,3671,208,333
People per km²564,100
Museums within 10 km00
UNESCO World Heritage sites within 50 km02
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 El Nido or Mombasa somewhere new.

Browse every destination

Sources

Structured data from Wikidata (CC0). Temperature and rainfall for destinations with no weather station are from the NASA POWER 2001-2020 climatology, derived from MERRA-2. 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. Weather data by Meteostat. Meteorological data provided by NOAA, DWD and others. 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 2026-11-02. Daily budgets are estimates from country price levels.