Florence or Split?
Two destinations compared on nine measures of openly sourced data. Weight what matters to you and the verdict follows.
Your match
Wins on sights concentration and museums & heritage with your weighting.
Wins on beaches & swimming and value for money with your weighting.
What matters to you?
Pick a travel style or drag the sliders. The match scores above update as you do.
The verdict
Choose Florence if the days are for museums, churches and streets crossed on foot: many times as many museums as Split, and far more notable places within walking distance of the centre.
Choose Split if the point is the water. It has 87 beaches nearby where Florence has none, and four months of sea warm enough to swim in.
Scoreboard
Each measure scored 0 to 100. Open a row for the figures behind the score.
Beaches & swimming. Split leads by 73 points.73
| Florence | Split | |
|---|---|---|
| Score | 0 | 73 |
| Swim season months | 0 | 4 |
| Beaches 10 km | 0 | 87 |
| Coast distance | 78 km | 0 km |
| Water distance | — | 0 km |
Places to eat. Florence leads by 21 points.21
| Florence | Split | |
|---|---|---|
| Score | 59 | 38 |
| Restaurants within 2 km of centre | 1,299 | 268 |
| Effective number of cuisines within 2 km | 15 | 15 |
Museums & heritage. Florence leads by 30 points.30
| Florence | Split | |
|---|---|---|
| Score | 82 | 52 |
| Museums within 10 km | 132 | 18 |
| Museums within 2 km of centre | 93 | 16 |
| Share of museums within 2 km % | 70 | 89 |
| Unesco sites within 50 km | 4 | 4 |
Nightlife. Florence leads by 15 points.15
| Florence | Split | |
|---|---|---|
| Score | 56 | 41 |
| Drinking venues within 4 km | 818 | 379 |
| Drinking venues within 2 km of centre | 599 | 263 |
| Share of drinking venues within 2 km % | 73 | 69 |
| Nightclubs within 4 km | 34 | 23 |
Nature & day trips. Florence and Split are level on 38.
| Florence | Split | |
|---|---|---|
| Score | 38 | 38 |
| Protected land share 50 km % | 9 | 9 |
| Landscape blanket share 50 km % | 2 | 0 |
| Land share of disc % | 100 | 62 |
| Park area within 2 km | 86 hectares | 30 hectares |
Good for families. Florence leads by 26 points.26
| Florence | Split | |
|---|---|---|
| Score | 52 | 26 |
| Tourist attractions within 2 km | 30 | 9 |
| Park area within 2 km | 86 hectares | 30 hectares |
| Theme parks within 30 km | 0 | 0 |
Sights concentration. Florence leads by 33 points.33
| Florence | Split | |
|---|---|---|
| Score | 75 | 42 |
| Notable places within 2 km | 292 | 43 |
| Min wikipedia languages | 5 | 5 |
Value for money. Split leads by 12 points.12
| Florence | Split | |
|---|---|---|
| Score | 68 | 80 |
| Price level global | 64.9 | 48.5 |
| Daily budget | €155 | €138 |
Year-round weather. Split leads by 1 points.1
| Florence | Split | |
|---|---|---|
| Score | 68 | 69 |
| Monthly daytime high | 10.8 °C to 32.7 °C | 10.7 °C to 31 °C |
| Monthly rainfall | 32 mm to 132 mm | 25 mm to 117 mm |
| Dry months | 2 | 2 |
Where they differ
Florence has many times as many museums as Split, and many times as many notable places within walking distance of the centre, so a day can be spent on foot without transport. There are also many times as many restaurants near the centre, about three times as many tourist attractions and three times as much park space.
Split's case is the coast: 87 beaches nearby against none in Florence, and sea warm enough to swim in for four months of the year.
Where they are alike
Day trips look much the same from either. 9% of the land around each is protected, and both have 4 UNESCO-listed places within reach of a day's travel, so neither is the stronger base for getting out of town.
Their weather years also track each other. The coldest month tops out at 11°C in both, the summer peaks sit 2°C apart, and each has dry summer months where rain drops to 40mm or less.
Which traveller are you?
If you are going for museums and heritage, Florence is the clear pick: many times as many museums as Split, and the notable places sit close enough together that a day works entirely on foot.
If the holiday means swimming, Split answers it and Florence cannot: 87 beaches nearby, sea warm enough for four months, and slightly milder summer days.
Travelling with children, Florence has about three times as many tourist attractions and three times as much park space near the centre. Neither has a theme park within reach, so plan around streets, parks and museums.
What the numbers don't tell you
The daily budget figures, €155 for Italy and €138 for Croatia, are national price levels for restaurants and hotels, not measurements of either city. A heavily visited city can sit far above its country's average, by more than the gap between these two numbers, so neither says what a week will cost.
Split's beaches only work for part of the year, and that window is exactly when its months rate highest, so the coast is at its best when it is most crowded. In Florence, the hottest weeks rate below late spring, and the warm early-autumn days carry the year's heaviest rain.
When should you go?
The figures behind each month. Each row is shaded against that destination's own year, so the deepest cell is its best month for that measure and the palest its weakest. Shades are not comparable between the two rows.
Temperature and rainfall are thirty-year climate normals, averaged over the years shown. Florence: 1995-2020 (sunshine 1991-2020, rainfall 1991-2020) normals, Firenze / Peretola (5.6 km from centre). Split: 1991-2020 normals, Split / Marjan (0.9 km from centre).
Late spring is Florence's peak: May and June bring highs of 24-29°C with 41-63mm of rain. Midsummer is drier but hotter. Autumn is the wet end of its year, 102-125mm across September and October, which is hard on a trip spent walking.
Split's season stretches later, with the sea at 22-25°C from June to September and 25mm of rain in the driest summer month. Late autumn is the wettest part of its year, so the swimming argument disappears then.
Getting there
| Flying from | Florence | Split |
|---|---|---|
| LondonLHR, LGW, STN, LTN +2 | 2 h 5 m €180-199 1 stop FLR · 6 km | 2 h 30 m €88-160 SPU · 12 km |
| ParisCDG, ORY, BVA | 1 h 40 m €143-159 FLR · 6 km | 2 h 5 m €169-225 SPU · 12 km |
| AmsterdamAMS | 1 h 55 m €232-255 2 stops FLR · 6 km | 2 h 10 m €186-201 1 stop SPU · 12 km |
| RomeFCO, CIA | 55 m €136-139 1 stop FLR · 6 km | 1 h 5 m €294 SPU · 12 km |
| FrankfurtFRA, HHN | 1 h 30 m no fares FLR · 6 km | 1 h 45 m €169-224 SPU · 12 km |
| MunichMUC | 1 h 15 m no fares FLR · 6 km | 1 h 25 m no fares SPU · 12 km |
| ViennaVIE | 1 h 25 m €185-255 1 stop FLR · 6 km | 1 h 15 m €233-281 SPU · 12 km |
| BarcelonaBCN | 1 h 35 m €113-168 FLR · 6 km | 2 h 5 m €108-177 SPU · 12 km |
| ZurichZRH | 1 h 10 m no fares FLR · 6 km | 1 h 35 m €247-298 1 stop SPU · 12 km |
| MadridMAD | 2 h 10 m no fares FLR · 6 km | 2 h 40 m no fares SPU · 12 km |
The busiest departure cities for these two, with a place kept for each other part of the world. Busiest means arriving passengers where an official count exists, and where none does, the number of non-stop services flown: official route statistics are published by the European reporting countries and by nobody else, so a table ranked on them alone would offer a reader in New York or Tokyo ten European cities. Flying times are estimated from the distance between airports, and every row is a city flown non-stop to both. Where the typical offer connects anyway, the stops are shown. Under each figure is the airport the flight lands at and how far that is from the centre, because the nearest airport is not always the one a route is flown to. Where both columns name the same airport it is one flight, and the difference between the two is the distance printed beside it. Typical return fares for 2026-09 to 2026-10, cached market data up to 7 days old. The figure is the middle half of the offers found, so a single price means they agreed and a range means they did not; for a typical route that middle half spans about a quarter of the median, and for the least settled routes rather more than the median itself.
Before you go
| Measure | Florence | Split |
|---|---|---|
| Official language | Italian | Croatian |
| Currency | Euro (EUR) | Euro (EUR) |
| Sockets | CFL230 V, 50 Hz | CF230 V, 50 Hz |
| Driving side | Right | Right |
| Time zone | UTC+1, UTC+2 in summer | UTC+1, UTC+2 in summer |
| Emergency number | 112 | 112 |
| Elevation | 50 m | 0 m |
| Main airport | Florence Airport, Peretola (FLR)6 km from centre36 non-stop destinations | Split Saint Jerome Airport (SPU)12 km from centre70 non-stop destinations |
| Public holidays this year | 13 days | 14 days |
By the numbers
| Measure | Florence | Split |
|---|---|---|
| City population | 360,930 | 160,577 |
| People per km² | 3,528 | – |
| Museums within 10 km | 140 | 11 |
| UNESCO World Heritage sites within 50 km | 4 | 4 |
| Distinct cuisines in the centre | 62 | 31 |
| Swim season, months above 21 °C | – | 4 months |
Where else could you go?
Every comparison below shares a destination with this one, so you can follow Florence or Split somewhere new.