VacationSelector
Florence and the Arno, Florence
FlorenceFlorence and the Arno
The Big Buddha on the hill above Phuket, Phuket
PhuketThe Big Buddha on the hill above Phuket

Photos: Florence by Wolfgang Weiser, Pexels License; Phuket by Mussi Katz, CC0.

Florence 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 Florence for

  • culture and sights
  • getting around
  • day trips

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

Choose Phuket for

  • beaches
  • wellness
  • prices

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. Florence 14, Phuket 90: Phuket leads by 76 points.
Food & drink. Florence 74, Phuket 66: Florence leads by 8 points.
Culture & sights. Florence 94, Phuket 35: Florence leads by 59 points.
Nightlife. Florence 42, Phuket 72: Phuket leads by 30 points.
Nature & outdoors. Florence 58, Phuket 80: Phuket leads by 22 points.
Day trips. Florence 98, Phuket 45: Florence leads by 53 points.
Good for families. Florence 45, Phuket 65: Phuket leads by 20 points.
Getting around. Florence 78, Phuket 22: Florence leads by 56 points.
Shopping & style. Florence 72, Phuket 42: Florence leads by 30 points.
Affordability. Florence 35, Phuket 68: Phuket leads by 33 points.
Live music & performing arts. Florence 58, Phuket 20: Florence leads by 38 points.
Wellness & relaxation. Florence 42, Phuket 82: Phuket leads by 40 points.
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What lies behind each score is written up on the two cities’ own pages: Florence and Phuket.

Your match

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

Too close to call, 2 points apart

Florence
59match

Wins on culture and sights and getting around with your weighting.

Phuket
57match

Wins on beaches and wellness with your weighting.

What matters to you?

When should you go?

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

Florence in July

32 °Cdaytime high
19 °Cnight-time low
37 mmrain in the month
11 hsunshine a day
No seasea
15 hdaylight a day

Phuket in July

32 °Cdaytime high
24 °Cnight-time low
287 mmrain in the month
No recordsunshine a day
30 °Csea
13 hdaylight a day

Daytime high, °C

0°10°20°30°40°JFMAMJJASOND

Rainfall in the month, mm

0100200300400JFMAMJJASOND
FlorencePhuket

Where the figures come from

Florence 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.

Florence's sunshine is measured 71 km from the centre, at Pisa / S. Giusto.

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

Temperature and rainfall are climate normals, averaged over the years shown. Florence: 1995-2020 (sunshine 1991-2020, rainfall 1991-2020) normals, Firenze / Peretola (5.6 km from centre). Phuket: 1991-2020 (rainfall 1961-1990) normals, Phuket Airport (26.9 km from centre).

Before you go

MeasureFlorencePhuket
Official languageItalianThai
CurrencyEuro (EUR)Baht (THB)
SocketsCFL230 V, 50 HzABCF220 V, 50 Hz
Driving sideRightLeft
Time zoneUTC+1, UTC+2 in summerUTC+7
Emergency number112Police 191, ambulance 1669, fire 199
Elevation50 m19 m
Main airportFlorence Airport, Peretola (FLR)6 km from centre46 non-stop destinationsPhuket International Airport (HKT)27 km from centre85 non-stop destinations
Public holidays this year13 days-

By the numbers

MeasureFlorencePhuket
City population360,93077,610
People per km²3,5286,468
Museums within 10 km1412
UNESCO World Heritage sites within 50 km40
Swim season, months above 21 °C-12 months

Where else could you go?

Every comparison below shares a destination with this one, so you can follow Florence or Phuket 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. Airport data from OurAirports (public domain). Tourism statistics from Eurostat, © European Union, reused under CC BY 4.0. 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. Ground elevations sampled from the Mapzen terrain tiles via OpenTopoData, merging SRTM, ASTER, NED, EU-DEM and national sources. Sea surface temperature from NOAA OISST v2.1, NOAA Physical Sciences Laboratory. 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 2026-10-31. Daily budgets are estimates from country price levels.