VacationSelector
Surfers Paradise from Narrowneck Beach, Gold Coast
Gold CoastSurfers Paradise from Narrowneck Beach
The main beach with the green hills behind, Sayulita
SayulitaThe main beach with the green hills behind

Photos: Gold Coast by Kgbo, CC BY-SA 4.0, cropped; Sayulita by Luisalvaz, CC BY-SA 4.0, cropped.

Gold Coast or Sayulita?

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 Gold Coast for

  • families
  • nightlife
  • live music and the arts

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

Choose Sayulita for

  • wellness
  • prices
  • getting around

What lies behind each score is written up on Sayulita’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. Gold Coast 92, Sayulita 80: Gold Coast leads by 12 points.
Food & drink. Gold Coast 47, Sayulita 42: Gold Coast leads by 5 points.
Culture & sights. Gold Coast 15, Sayulita 7: Gold Coast leads by 8 points.
Nightlife. Gold Coast 55, Sayulita 33: Gold Coast leads by 22 points.
Nature & outdoors. Gold Coast 82, Sayulita 72: Gold Coast leads by 10 points.
Day trips. Gold Coast 52, Sayulita 42: Gold Coast leads by 10 points.
Good for families. Gold Coast 89, Sayulita 42: Gold Coast leads by 47 points.
Getting around. Gold Coast 45, Sayulita 48: Sayulita leads by 3 points.
Shopping & style. Gold Coast 40, Sayulita 33: Gold Coast leads by 7 points.
Affordability. Gold Coast 35, Sayulita 45: Sayulita leads by 10 points.
Live music & performing arts. Gold Coast 30, Sayulita 12: Gold Coast leads by 18 points.
Wellness & relaxation. Gold Coast 42, Sayulita 58: Sayulita leads by 16 points.
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What lies behind each score is written up on the two cities’ own pages: Gold Coast and Sayulita.

Your match

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

Gold Coast
Best match
52match

Wins on families and nightlife with your weighting.

Sayulita
43match

Wins on wellness and prices with your weighting.

What matters to you?

When should you go?

Pick your month. The climate figures are measured averages, not a forecast.

Gold Coast in July

22 °Cdaytime high
12 °Cnight-time low
59 mmrain in the month
8 hsunshine a day
21 °Csea
11 hdaylight a day

Sayulita in July

29 °Cdaytime high
27 °Cnight-time low
342 mmrain in the month
No recordsunshine a day
30 °Csea
13 hdaylight a day

Daytime high, °C

0°10°20°30°JFMAMJJASOND

Rainfall in the month, mm

0100200300400JFMAMJJASOND
Gold CoastSayulita

Where the figures come from

Gold Coast's sunshine is measured 75 km from the centre, at Brisbane Airport.

Sayulita 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. Gold Coast: 1991-2020 normals, Gold Coast Seaway (13 km from centre). Sayulita: 2001-2020 normals, NASA POWER reanalysis grid, no weather station within 90 km.

Before you go

MeasureGold CoastSayulita
Official languageEnglishSpanish, Nahuatl, Yucatec Maya
CurrencyAustralian Dollar (AUD)Mexican Peso (MXN)
SocketsI230 V, 50 HzAB127 V, 60 Hz
Driving sideLeftRight
Time zoneUTC+10UTC-6
Emergency number000911
Elevation12 m2 m
Main airportGold Coast Airport (OOL)20 km from centre19 non-stop destinationsPuerto Vallarta International Airport (PVR)29 km from centre52 non-stop destinations
Public holidays this year11 days9 days

By the numbers

MeasureGold CoastSayulita
City population607,6653,390
People per km²433-
Museums within 10 km20
UNESCO World Heritage sites within 50 km11
Swim season, months above 21 °C12 months12 months

Where else could you go?

Every comparison below shares a destination with this one, so you can follow Gold Coast or Sayulita 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 2026-11-02. Daily budgets are estimates from country price levels.