VacationSelector
The entrance to the Big Lagoon, El Nido
El NidoThe entrance to the Big Lagoon
A madrasa and its minarets on the Registan, Samarkand
SamarkandA madrasa and its minarets on the Registan

Photos: El Nido by nennnn, CC BY 2.0, cropped; Samarkand by Yaşar Başkurt, Pexels License.

El Nido or Samarkand?

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
  • nature and the outdoors
  • nightlife

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

Choose Samarkand for

  • culture and sights
  • day trips
  • getting around

What lies behind each score is written up on Samarkand’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, Samarkand 4: El Nido leads by 88 points.
Food & drink. El Nido 27, Samarkand 54: Samarkand leads by 27 points.
Culture & sights. El Nido 4, Samarkand 84: Samarkand leads by 80 points.
Nightlife. El Nido 30, Samarkand 14: El Nido leads by 16 points.
Nature & outdoors. El Nido 87, Samarkand 40: El Nido leads by 47 points.
Day trips. El Nido 8, Samarkand 72: Samarkand leads by 64 points.
Good for families. El Nido 40, Samarkand 30: El Nido leads by 10 points.
Getting around. El Nido 22, Samarkand 58: Samarkand leads by 36 points.
Shopping & style. El Nido 7, Samarkand 42: Samarkand leads by 35 points.
Affordability. El Nido 64, Samarkand 80: Samarkand leads by 16 points.
Live music & performing arts. El Nido 7, Samarkand 24: Samarkand leads by 17 points.
Wellness & relaxation. El Nido 46, Samarkand 32: El Nido leads by 14 points.
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What lies behind each score is written up on the two cities’ own pages: El Nido and Samarkand.

Your match

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

El Nido
36match

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

Samarkand
Best match
45match

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

Samarkand in July

34 °Cdaytime high
19 °Cnight-time low
2 mmrain in the month
12 hsunshine a day
No seasea
15 hdaylight a day

Daytime high, °C

0°10°20°30°40°JFMAMJJASOND

Rainfall in the month, mm

0100200300400JFMAMJJASOND
El NidoSamarkand

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.

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. Samarkand: 1991-2020 normals, Samarkand (10 km from centre).

Before you go

MeasureEl NidoSamarkand
Official languageEnglish, Filipino, TaglishUzbek
CurrencyPhilippine Peso (PHP)Uzbekistan Sum (UZS)
SocketsABC220 V, 60 HzCFI220 V, 50 Hz
Driving sideRightRight
Time zoneUTC+8UTC+5
Emergency number911112
Elevation35 m702 m
Main airportEl Nido Airport (ENI)4 km from centre5 non-stop destinationsSamarkand International Airport (SKD)5 km from centre29 non-stop destinations
Public holidays this year18 days-

By the numbers

MeasureEl NidoSamarkand
City population51,367546,303
People per km²565,058
Museums within 10 km011
UNESCO World Heritage sites within 50 km01
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 Samarkand 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.