VacationSelector
Praia Mole in Florianopolis, Florianopolis
FlorianopolisPraia Mole in Florianopolis
The old Bath House in the Government Gardens, Rotorua
RotoruaThe old Bath House in the Government Gardens

Photos: Florianopolis by Papa Pic, CC0; Rotorua by W. Bulach, CC BY-SA 4.0, cropped.

Florianopolis 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 Florianopolis for

  • beaches
  • nightlife
  • food and drink

What lies behind each score is written up on Florianopolis’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. Florianopolis 85, Rotorua 33: Florianopolis leads by 52 points.
Food & drink. Florianopolis 58, Rotorua 33: Florianopolis leads by 25 points.
Culture & sights. Florianopolis 33, Rotorua 38: Rotorua leads by 5 points.
Nightlife. Florianopolis 60, Rotorua 14: Florianopolis leads by 46 points.
Nature & outdoors. Florianopolis 78, Rotorua 86: Rotorua leads by 8 points.
Day trips. Florianopolis 50, Rotorua 45: Florianopolis leads by 5 points.
Good for families. Florianopolis 60, Rotorua 68: Rotorua leads by 8 points.
Getting around. Florianopolis 28, Rotorua 30: Rotorua leads by 2 points.
Shopping & style. Florianopolis 33, Rotorua 22: Florianopolis leads by 11 points.
Affordability. Florianopolis 60, Rotorua 36: Florianopolis leads by 24 points.
Live music & performing arts. Florianopolis 28, Rotorua 30: Rotorua leads by 2 points.
Wellness & relaxation. Florianopolis 45, Rotorua 86: Rotorua leads by 41 points.
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What lies behind each score is written up on the two cities’ own pages: Florianopolis and Rotorua.

Your match

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

Florianopolis
Best match
52match

Wins on beaches and nightlife 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.

Florianopolis in July

21 °Cdaytime high
13 °Cnight-time low
91 mmrain in the month
5 hsunshine a day
18 °Csea
11 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°JFMAMJJASOND

Rainfall in the month, mm

050100150200250JFMAMJJASOND
FlorianopolisRotorua

Where the figures come from

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. Florianopolis: 1991-2020 normals, Florianopolis (1.7 km from centre). Rotorua: 2001-2020 normals, NASA POWER reanalysis grid, no weather station within 90 km.

Before you go

MeasureFlorianopolisRotorua
Official languagePortugueseEnglish, New Zealand Sign Language, Māori
CurrencyBrazilian Real (BRL)New Zealand Dollar (NZD)
SocketsCN60 HzI230 V, 50 Hz
Driving sideRightLeft
Time zoneUTC-3UTC+12, UTC+13 in summer
Emergency numberPolice 190, ambulance 192, fire 193111
Elevation3 m280 m
Main airportHercílio Luz International Airport (FLN)9 km from centre21 non-stop destinationsRotorua Regional Airport (ROT)7 km from centre3 non-stop destinations
Public holidays this year14 days12 days

By the numbers

MeasureFlorianopolisRotorua
City population587,48658,500
People per km²87022
Museums within 10 km111
UNESCO World Heritage sites within 50 km00
Swim season, months above 21 °C7 monthsNone

Where else could you go?

Every comparison below shares a destination with this one, so you can follow Florianopolis 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. Sea surface temperature from NOAA OISST v2.1, NOAA Physical Sciences Laboratory. Airport data from OurAirports (public domain). Public holidays from Nager.Date (MIT). Exchange rates via Frankfurter, based on European Central Bank reference rates. 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. 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.