VacationSelector
Praia Mole in Florianopolis, Florianopolis
FlorianopolisPraia Mole in Florianopolis
The adobe New Mexico Museum of Art, Santa Fe
Santa FeThe adobe New Mexico Museum of Art

Photos: Florianopolis by Papa Pic, CC0; Santa Fe by dconvertini, CC BY-SA 2.0, cropped.

Florianopolis or Santa Fe?

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
  • prices

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

Choose Santa Fe for

  • culture and sights
  • shopping
  • live music and the arts

What lies behind each score is written up on Santa Fe’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, Santa Fe 5: Florianopolis leads by 80 points.
Food & drink. Florianopolis 58, Santa Fe 62: Santa Fe leads by 4 points.
Culture & sights. Florianopolis 33, Santa Fe 66: Santa Fe leads by 33 points.
Nightlife. Florianopolis 60, Santa Fe 22: Florianopolis leads by 38 points.
Nature & outdoors. Florianopolis 78, Santa Fe 80: Santa Fe leads by 2 points.
Day trips. Florianopolis 50, Santa Fe 70: Santa Fe leads by 20 points.
Good for families. Florianopolis 60, Santa Fe 45: Florianopolis leads by 15 points.
Getting around. Florianopolis 28, Santa Fe 40: Santa Fe leads by 12 points.
Shopping & style. Florianopolis 33, Santa Fe 62: Santa Fe leads by 29 points.
Affordability. Florianopolis 60, Santa Fe 30: Florianopolis leads by 30 points.
Live music & performing arts. Florianopolis 28, Santa Fe 55: Santa Fe leads by 27 points.
Wellness & relaxation. Florianopolis 45, Santa Fe 55: Santa Fe leads by 10 points.
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What lies behind each score is written up on the two cities’ own pages: Florianopolis and Santa Fe.

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.

Santa Fe
49match

Wins on culture and sights and shopping 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

Santa Fe in July

31 °Cdaytime high
16 °Cnight-time low
60 mmrain in the month
No recordsunshine a day
No seasea
14 hdaylight a day

Daytime high, °C

0°10°20°30°40°JFMAMJJASOND

Rainfall in the month, mm

050100150200250JFMAMJJASOND
FlorianopolisSanta Fe

Where the figures come from

Santa Fe's station stands 199 m below the city centre, so the centre is likely a little cooler than the figures say.

Santa Fe 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. Florianopolis: 1991-2020 normals, Florianopolis (1.7 km from centre). Santa Fe: 1991-2020 normals, Santa Fe / Cieneguilla (12.4 km from centre).

Before you go

MeasureFlorianopolisSanta Fe
Official languagePortuguese-
CurrencyBrazilian Real (BRL)US Dollar (USD)
SocketsCN60 HzAB120 V, 60 Hz
Driving sideRightRight
Time zoneUTC-3UTC-7, UTC-6 in summer
Emergency numberPolice 190, ambulance 192, fire 193911
Elevation3 m2,134 m
Main airportHercílio Luz International Airport (FLN)9 km from centre21 non-stop destinationsSanta Fe Municipal Airport (SAF)12 km from centre5 non-stop destinations
Public holidays this year14 days13 days

By the numbers

MeasureFlorianopolisSanta Fe
City population587,48687,505
People per km²870645
Museums within 10 km1110
UNESCO World Heritage sites within 50 km00
Swim season, months above 21 °C7 months-

Where else could you go?

Every comparison below shares a destination with this one, so you can follow Florianopolis or Santa Fe 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. 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.