VacationSelector
The entrance to the Big Lagoon, El Nido
El NidoThe entrance to the Big Lagoon
The Big Buddha on the hill above Phuket, Phuket
PhuketThe Big Buddha on the hill above Phuket

Photos: El Nido by nennnn, CC BY 2.0, cropped; Phuket by Mussi Katz, CC0.

El Nido or Phuket?

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

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

Choose Phuket for

  • nightlife
  • food and drink
  • day trips

What lies behind each score is written up on Phuket’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, Phuket 90: El Nido leads by 2 points.
Food & drink. El Nido 27, Phuket 66: Phuket leads by 39 points.
Culture & sights. El Nido 4, Phuket 35: Phuket leads by 31 points.
Nightlife. El Nido 30, Phuket 72: Phuket leads by 42 points.
Nature & outdoors. El Nido 87, Phuket 80: El Nido leads by 7 points.
Day trips. El Nido 8, Phuket 45: Phuket leads by 37 points.
Good for families. El Nido 40, Phuket 65: Phuket leads by 25 points.
Getting around. El Nido and Phuket are level on 22.
Shopping & style. El Nido 7, Phuket 42: Phuket leads by 35 points.
Affordability. El Nido 64, Phuket 68: Phuket leads by 4 points.
Live music & performing arts. El Nido 7, Phuket 20: Phuket leads by 13 points.
Wellness & relaxation. El Nido 46, Phuket 82: Phuket leads by 36 points.
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What lies behind each score is written up on the two cities’ own pages: El Nido and Phuket.

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.

Phuket
Best match
57match

Wins on nightlife and food and drink 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

Phuket in July

32 °Cdaytime high
24 °Cnight-time low
287 mmrain in the month
30 °Csea
13 hdaylight a day

Daytime high, °C

0°10°20°30°40°JFMAMJJASOND

Rainfall in the month, mm

0100200300400JFMAMJJASOND
El NidoPhuket

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.

Phuket's temperatures are measured 27 km from the centre, at Phuket Airport.

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. Phuket: 1991-2020 (rainfall 1961-1990) normals, Phuket Airport (26.9 km from centre).

Before you go

MeasureEl NidoPhuket
Official languageEnglish, Filipino, TaglishThai
CurrencyPhilippine Peso (PHP)Baht (THB)
SocketsABC220 V, 60 HzABCF220 V, 50 Hz
Driving sideRightLeft
Time zoneUTC+8UTC+7
Emergency number911Police 191, ambulance 1669, fire 199
Elevation35 m19 m
Main airportEl Nido Airport (ENI)4 km from centre5 non-stop destinationsPhuket International Airport (HKT)27 km from centre85 non-stop destinations
Public holidays this year18 days-

By the numbers

MeasureEl NidoPhuket
City population51,36777,610
People per km²566,468
Museums within 10 km02
UNESCO World Heritage sites within 50 km00
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 Phuket 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. Ground elevations sampled from the Mapzen terrain tiles via OpenTopoData, merging SRTM, ASTER, NED, EU-DEM and national sources. 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.