VacationSelector
The entrance to the Big Lagoon, El Nido
El NidoThe entrance to the Big Lagoon
The church of San Francisco under a blue sky, Quito
QuitoThe church of San Francisco under a blue sky

Photos: El Nido by nennnn, CC BY 2.0, cropped; Quito by Bernard Gagnon, CC BY-SA 3.0, cropped.

El Nido or Quito?

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
  • families
  • wellness

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

Choose Quito for

  • culture and sights
  • day trips
  • shopping

What lies behind each score is written up on Quito’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, Quito 5: El Nido leads by 87 points.
Food & drink. El Nido 27, Quito 54: Quito leads by 27 points.
Culture & sights. El Nido 4, Quito 77: Quito leads by 73 points.
Nightlife. El Nido 30, Quito 40: Quito leads by 10 points.
Nature & outdoors. El Nido 87, Quito 86: El Nido leads by 1 points.
Day trips. El Nido 8, Quito 55: Quito leads by 47 points.
Good for families. El Nido 40, Quito 32: El Nido leads by 8 points.
Getting around. El Nido 22, Quito 45: Quito leads by 23 points.
Shopping & style. El Nido 7, Quito 40: Quito leads by 33 points.
Affordability. El Nido 64, Quito 78: Quito leads by 14 points.
Live music & performing arts. El Nido 7, Quito 38: Quito leads by 31 points.
Wellness & relaxation. El Nido 46, Quito 44: El Nido leads by 2 points.
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What lies behind each score is written up on the two cities’ own pages: El Nido and Quito.

Your match

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

El Nido
36match

Wins on beaches and families with your weighting.

Quito
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
No recordsunshine a day
29 °Csea
13 hdaylight a day

Quito in July

18 °Cdaytime high
5 °Cnight-time low
32 mmrain in the month
7 hsunshine a day
No seasea
12 hdaylight a day

Daytime high, °C

0°10°20°30°40°JFMAMJJASOND

Rainfall in the month, mm

0100200300400JFMAMJJASOND
El NidoQuito

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.

Quito's station stands 208 m above the city centre, so the centre is likely a little warmer than the figures say.

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. Quito: 1961-1990 normals, Izobamba-Santa Catalina (16.8 km from centre).

Before you go

MeasureEl NidoQuito
Official languageEnglish, Filipino, TaglishSpanish, Shuar, Northern Quichua
CurrencyPhilippine Peso (PHP)US Dollar (USD)
SocketsABC220 V, 60 HzAB120 V, 60 Hz
Driving sideRightRight
Time zoneUTC+8UTC-5
Emergency number911911
Elevation35 m2,850 m
Main airportEl Nido Airport (ENI)4 km from centre5 non-stop destinationsMariscal Sucre International Airport (UIO)20 km from centre22 non-stop destinations
Public holidays this year18 days11 days

By the numbers

MeasureEl NidoQuito
City population51,3671,763,275
People per km²564,735
Museums within 10 km016
UNESCO World Heritage sites within 50 km02
Swim season, months above 21 °C12 months-

Where else could you go?

Every comparison below shares a destination with this one, so you can follow El Nido or Quito 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.