VacationSelector
The white medina above the harbour walls, Essaouira
EssaouiraThe white medina above the harbour walls
Surfers Paradise from Narrowneck Beach, Gold Coast
Gold CoastSurfers Paradise from Narrowneck Beach

Photos: Essaouira by Manel Cusido, Pexels License; Gold Coast by Kgbo, CC BY-SA 4.0, cropped.

Essaouira or Gold Coast?

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 Essaouira for

  • prices
  • culture and sights
  • wellness

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

Choose Gold Coast for

  • families
  • beaches
  • nightlife

What lies behind each score is written up on Gold Coast’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. Essaouira 47, Gold Coast 92: Gold Coast leads by 45 points.
Food & drink. Essaouira 44, Gold Coast 47: Gold Coast leads by 3 points.
Culture & sights. Essaouira 48, Gold Coast 15: Essaouira leads by 33 points.
Nightlife. Essaouira 14, Gold Coast 55: Gold Coast leads by 41 points.
Nature & outdoors. Essaouira 57, Gold Coast 82: Gold Coast leads by 25 points.
Day trips. Essaouira 17, Gold Coast 52: Gold Coast leads by 35 points.
Good for families. Essaouira 42, Gold Coast 89: Gold Coast leads by 47 points.
Getting around. Essaouira 58, Gold Coast 45: Essaouira leads by 13 points.
Shopping & style. Essaouira 44, Gold Coast 40: Essaouira leads by 4 points.
Affordability. Essaouira 74, Gold Coast 35: Essaouira leads by 39 points.
Live music & performing arts. Essaouira 28, Gold Coast 30: Gold Coast leads by 2 points.
Wellness & relaxation. Essaouira 66, Gold Coast 42: Essaouira leads by 24 points.
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What lies behind each score is written up on the two cities’ own pages: Essaouira and Gold Coast.

Your match

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

Essaouira
45match

Wins on prices and culture and sights with your weighting.

Gold Coast
Best match
52match

Wins on families and beaches with your weighting.

What matters to you?

When should you go?

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

Essaouira in July

22 °Cdaytime high
18 °Cnight-time low
0 mmrain in the month
No recordsunshine a day
20 °Csea
14 hdaylight a day

Gold Coast in July

22 °Cdaytime high
12 °Cnight-time low
59 mmrain in the month
8 hsunshine a day
21 °Csea
11 hdaylight a day

Daytime high, °C

0°10°20°30°JFMAMJJASOND

Rainfall in the month, mm

050100150200250JFMAMJJASOND
EssaouiraGold Coast

Where the figures come from

Essaouira 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.

Gold Coast's sunshine is measured 75 km from the centre, at Brisbane Airport.

Temperature and rainfall are climate normals, averaged over the years shown. Essaouira: 1991-2020 normals, Essaouira (1.4 km from centre). Gold Coast: 1991-2020 normals, Gold Coast Seaway (13 km from centre).

Before you go

MeasureEssaouiraGold Coast
Official languageArabic, Standard Moroccan TamazightEnglish
CurrencyMoroccan Dirham (MAD)Australian Dollar (AUD)
SocketsCE50 HzI230 V, 50 Hz
Driving sideRightLeft
Time zoneUTC+1UTC+10
Emergency numberPolice 19/112, ambulance 15, fire 15000
Elevation11 m12 m
Main airportEssaouira-Mogador Airport (ESU)15 km from centre13 non-stop destinationsGold Coast Airport (OOL)20 km from centre19 non-stop destinations
Public holidays this year11 days11 days

By the numbers

MeasureEssaouiraGold Coast
City population82,962607,665
People per km²16,592433
Museums within 10 km22
UNESCO World Heritage sites within 50 km11
Swim season, months above 21 °CNone12 months

Where else could you go?

Every comparison below shares a destination with this one, so you can follow Essaouira or Gold Coast somewhere new.

Browse every destination

Sources

Structured data from Wikidata (CC0). Weather data by Meteostat. Meteorological data provided by NOAA, DWD and others. 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). 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. Exchange rates via Frankfurter, based on European Central Bank reference rates. 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 2026-11-01. Daily budgets are estimates from country price levels.