VacationSelector
The entrance to the Big Lagoon, El Nido
El NidoThe entrance to the Big Lagoon
The towers of Panama City reflected in the bay in golden light, Panama City
Panama CityThe towers of Panama City reflected in the bay in golden light

Photos: El Nido by nennnn, CC BY 2.0, cropped; Panama City by Ayaita, CC BY-SA 3.0, cropped.

El Nido or Panama City?

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

  • beaches
  • wellness
  • nature and the outdoors

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

Choose Panama City for

  • culture and sights
  • shopping
  • day trips

What lies behind each score is written up on Panama City’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, Panama City 44: El Nido leads by 48 points.
Food & drink. El Nido 27, Panama City 57: Panama City leads by 30 points.
Culture & sights. El Nido 4, Panama City 62: Panama City leads by 58 points.
Nightlife. El Nido 30, Panama City 62: Panama City leads by 32 points.
Nature & outdoors. El Nido 87, Panama City 74: El Nido leads by 13 points.
Day trips. El Nido 8, Panama City 50: Panama City leads by 42 points.
Good for families. El Nido 40, Panama City 45: Panama City leads by 5 points.
Getting around. El Nido 22, Panama City 40: Panama City leads by 18 points.
Shopping & style. El Nido 7, Panama City 52: Panama City leads by 45 points.
Affordability. El Nido 64, Panama City 55: El Nido leads by 9 points.
Live music & performing arts. El Nido 7, Panama City 34: Panama City leads by 27 points.
Wellness & relaxation. El Nido 46, Panama City 22: El Nido leads by 24 points.
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What lies behind each score is written up on the two cities’ own pages: El Nido and Panama City.

Your match

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

El Nido
36match

Wins on beaches and wellness with your weighting.

Panama City
Best match
50match

Wins on culture and sights and shopping 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

Panama City in July

31 °Cdaytime high
24 °Cnight-time low
161 mmrain in the month
29 °Csea
13 hdaylight a day

Daytime high, °C

0°10°20°30°40°JFMAMJJASOND

Rainfall in the month, mm

0100200300400500JFMAMJJASOND
El NidoPanama City

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.

Panama City 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. Panama City: 1991-2020 normals, Tocumen (20.4 km from centre).

Before you go

MeasureEl NidoPanama City
Official languageEnglish, Filipino, TaglishSpanish
CurrencyPhilippine Peso (PHP)Balboa (PAB)
SocketsABC220 V, 60 HzAB110 V, 60 Hz
Driving sideRightRight
Time zoneUTC+8UTC-5
Emergency number911911
Elevation35 m20 m
Main airportEl Nido Airport (ENI)4 km from centre5 non-stop destinationsTocumen International Airport (PTY)20 km from centre92 non-stop destinations
Public holidays this year18 days14 days

By the numbers

MeasureEl NidoPanama City
City population51,3671,540,000
People per km²565,600
Museums within 10 km010
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 Panama City 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.