VacationSelector
The white medina above the harbour walls, Essaouira
EssaouiraThe white medina above the harbour walls
Flinders Street Station, Melbourne
MelbourneFlinders Street Station

Photos: Essaouira by Manel Cusido, Pexels License; Melbourne by Medelam, CC BY-SA 4.0, cropped.

Essaouira or Melbourne?

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
  • wellness

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

Choose Melbourne for

  • nightlife
  • day trips
  • live music and the arts

What lies behind each score is written up on Melbourne’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, Melbourne 50: Melbourne leads by 3 points.
Food & drink. Essaouira 44, Melbourne 75: Melbourne leads by 31 points.
Culture & sights. Essaouira 48, Melbourne 57: Melbourne leads by 9 points.
Nightlife. Essaouira 14, Melbourne 75: Melbourne leads by 61 points.
Nature & outdoors. Essaouira 57, Melbourne 70: Melbourne leads by 13 points.
Day trips. Essaouira 17, Melbourne 62: Melbourne leads by 45 points.
Good for families. Essaouira 42, Melbourne 73: Melbourne leads by 31 points.
Getting around. Essaouira 58, Melbourne 76: Melbourne leads by 18 points.
Shopping & style. Essaouira 44, Melbourne 70: Melbourne leads by 26 points.
Affordability. Essaouira 74, Melbourne 31: Essaouira leads by 43 points.
Live music & performing arts. Essaouira 28, Melbourne 72: Melbourne leads by 44 points.
Wellness & relaxation. Essaouira 66, Melbourne 54: Essaouira leads by 12 points.
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What lies behind each score is written up on the two cities’ own pages: Essaouira and Melbourne.

Your match

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

Essaouira
45match

Wins on prices and wellness with your weighting.

Melbourne
Best match
64match

Wins on nightlife 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.

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

Melbourne in July

14 °Cdaytime high
6 °Cnight-time low
46 mmrain in the month
4 hsunshine a day
12 °Csea
10 hdaylight a day

Daytime high, °C

0°10°20°30°JFMAMJJASOND

Rainfall in the month, mm

020406080JFMAMJJASOND
EssaouiraMelbourne

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.

Temperature and rainfall are climate normals, averaged over the years shown. Essaouira: 1991-2020 normals, Essaouira (1.4 km from centre). Melbourne: 1991-2020 normals, Latrobe University / Kingsbury (13.1 km from centre).

Before you go

MeasureEssaouiraMelbourne
Official languageArabic, Standard Moroccan TamazightEnglish
CurrencyMoroccan Dirham (MAD)Australian Dollar (AUD)
SocketsCE50 HzI230 V, 50 Hz
Driving sideRightLeft
Time zoneUTC+1UTC+10, UTC+11 in summer
Emergency numberPolice 19/112, ambulance 15, fire 15000
Elevation11 m31 m
Main airportEssaouira-Mogador Airport (ESU)15 km from centre13 non-stop destinationsMelbourne Airport (MEL)19 km from centre69 non-stop destinations
Public holidays this year11 days13 days

By the numbers

MeasureEssaouiraMelbourne
City population82,9625,350,705
People per km²16,592535
Museums within 10 km243
UNESCO World Heritage sites within 50 km11
Swim season, months above 21 °CNoneNone

Where else could you go?

Every comparison below shares a destination with this one, so you can follow Essaouira or Melbourne 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.