VacationSelector
Florence and the Arno, Florence
FlorenceFlorence and the Arno
The old Bath House in the Government Gardens, Rotorua
RotoruaThe old Bath House in the Government Gardens

Photos: Florence by Wolfgang Weiser, Pexels License; Rotorua by W. Bulach, CC BY-SA 4.0, cropped.

Florence or Rotorua?

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
  • day trips
  • shopping

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

Choose Rotorua for

  • wellness
  • nature and the outdoors
  • families

What lies behind each score is written up on Rotorua’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, Rotorua 33: Rotorua leads by 19 points.
Food & drink. Florence 74, Rotorua 33: Florence leads by 41 points.
Culture & sights. Florence 94, Rotorua 38: Florence leads by 56 points.
Nightlife. Florence 42, Rotorua 14: Florence leads by 28 points.
Nature & outdoors. Florence 58, Rotorua 86: Rotorua leads by 28 points.
Day trips. Florence 98, Rotorua 45: Florence leads by 53 points.
Good for families. Florence 45, Rotorua 68: Rotorua leads by 23 points.
Getting around. Florence 78, Rotorua 30: Florence leads by 48 points.
Shopping & style. Florence 72, Rotorua 22: Florence leads by 50 points.
Affordability. Florence 35, Rotorua 36: Rotorua leads by 1 points.
Live music & performing arts. Florence 58, Rotorua 30: Florence leads by 28 points.
Wellness & relaxation. Florence 42, Rotorua 86: Rotorua leads by 44 points.
0255075100

What lies behind each score is written up on the two cities’ own pages: Florence and Rotorua.

Your match

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

Florence
Best match
59match

Wins on culture and sights and day trips with your weighting.

Rotorua
43match

Wins on wellness and nature and the outdoors 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

Rotorua in July

11 °Cdaytime high
6 °Cnight-time low
113 mmrain in the month
No recordsunshine a day
15 °Csea
10 hdaylight a day

Daytime high, °C

0°10°20°30°40°JFMAMJJASOND

Rainfall in the month, mm

0255075100125JFMAMJJASOND
FlorenceRotorua

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.

Rotorua 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. Florence: 1995-2020 (sunshine 1991-2020, rainfall 1991-2020) normals, Firenze / Peretola (5.6 km from centre). Rotorua: 2001-2020 normals, NASA POWER reanalysis grid, no weather station within 90 km.

Before you go

MeasureFlorenceRotorua
Official languageItalianEnglish, New Zealand Sign Language, Māori
CurrencyEuro (EUR)New Zealand Dollar (NZD)
SocketsCFL230 V, 50 HzI230 V, 50 Hz
Driving sideRightLeft
Time zoneUTC+1, UTC+2 in summerUTC+12, UTC+13 in summer
Emergency number112111
Elevation50 m280 m
Main airportFlorence Airport, Peretola (FLR)6 km from centre46 non-stop destinationsRotorua Regional Airport (ROT)7 km from centre3 non-stop destinations
Public holidays this year13 days12 days

By the numbers

MeasureFlorenceRotorua
City population360,93058,500
People per km²3,52822
Museums within 10 km1411
UNESCO World Heritage sites within 50 km40
Swim season, months above 21 °C-None

Where else could you go?

Every comparison below shares a destination with this one, so you can follow Florence or Rotorua 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. Temperature and rainfall for destinations with no weather station are from the NASA POWER 2001-2020 climatology, derived from MERRA-2. 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 2026-11-01. Daily budgets are estimates from country price levels.