VacationSelector
The skyline and yachts on the canals, Fort Lauderdale
Fort LauderdaleThe skyline and yachts on the canals
The Treasury, Al-Khazneh, cut into the rock, Petra
PetraThe Treasury, Al-Khazneh, cut into the rock

Photos: Fort Lauderdale by KeanoManu, CC BY-SA 4.0, cropped; Petra by Yasir Gürbüz, Pexels License.

Fort Lauderdale or Petra?

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 Fort Lauderdale for

  • beaches
  • nightlife
  • families

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

Choose Petra for

  • culture and sights
  • nature and the outdoors
  • prices

What lies behind each score is written up on Petra’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. Fort Lauderdale 88, Petra 5: Fort Lauderdale leads by 83 points.
Food & drink. Fort Lauderdale 47, Petra 22: Fort Lauderdale leads by 25 points.
Culture & sights. Fort Lauderdale 28, Petra 85: Petra leads by 57 points.
Nightlife. Fort Lauderdale 52, Petra 5: Fort Lauderdale leads by 47 points.
Nature & outdoors. Fort Lauderdale 62, Petra 78: Petra leads by 16 points.
Day trips. Fort Lauderdale 58, Petra 30: Fort Lauderdale leads by 28 points.
Good for families. Fort Lauderdale 66, Petra 25: Fort Lauderdale leads by 41 points.
Getting around. Fort Lauderdale 32, Petra 25: Fort Lauderdale leads by 7 points.
Shopping & style. Fort Lauderdale 52, Petra 18: Fort Lauderdale leads by 34 points.
Affordability. Fort Lauderdale 32, Petra 45: Petra leads by 13 points.
Live music & performing arts. Fort Lauderdale 42, Petra 10: Fort Lauderdale leads by 32 points.
Wellness & relaxation. Fort Lauderdale 40, Petra 28: Fort Lauderdale leads by 12 points.
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What lies behind each score is written up on the two cities’ own pages: Fort Lauderdale and Petra.

Your match

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

Fort Lauderdale
Best match
50match

Wins on beaches and nightlife with your weighting.

Petra
31match

Wins on culture and sights 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.

Fort Lauderdale in July

32 °Cdaytime high
26 °Cnight-time low
166 mmrain in the month
No recordsunshine a day
29 °Csea
14 hdaylight a day

Petra in July

35 °Cdaytime high
19 °Cnight-time low
0 mmrain in the month
12 hsunshine a day
No seasea
14 hdaylight a day

Daytime high, °C

0°10°20°30°40°JFMAMJJASOND

Rainfall in the month, mm

050100150200250JFMAMJJASOND
Fort LauderdalePetra

Where the figures come from

Petra's temperatures are measured 34 km from the centre, at Ma'An.

Petra's station stands 219 m above the city centre, so the centre is likely a little warmer than the figures say.

Petra 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. Fort Lauderdale: 1991-2020 normals, Fort Lauderdale (7.1 km from centre). Petra: 1991-2020 normals, Ma'An (33.9 km from centre).

Before you go

MeasureFort LauderdalePetra
Official language-Arabic
CurrencyUS Dollar (USD)Jordanian Dinar (JOD)
SocketsAB120 V, 60 HzBCFGJ230 V, 50 Hz
Driving sideRightRight
Time zoneUTC-5, UTC-4 in summerUTC+3
Emergency number911911
Elevation11 m850 m
Main airportFort Lauderdale Hollywood International Airport (FLL)7 km from centre136 non-stop destinationsKing Hussein International Airport (AQJ)90 km from centre5 non-stop destinations
Public holidays this year11 days-

By the numbers

MeasureFort LauderdalePetra
City population182,760-
People per km²1,829-
Museums within 10 km62
UNESCO World Heritage sites within 50 km01
Swim season, months above 21 °C12 months-

Where else could you go?

Every comparison below shares a destination with this one, so you can follow Fort Lauderdale or Petra 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 2026-10-31. Daily budgets are estimates from country price levels.