VacationSelector
The Sun and Moon pagodas on Shan Lake, Guilin
GuilinThe Sun and Moon pagodas on Shan Lake
The Plaza de los Naranjos and its fountain in the old town, Marbella
MarbellaThe Plaza de los Naranjos and its fountain in the old town

Photos: Guilin by xiquinhosilva, CC BY 2.0, cropped; Marbella by Décio Franchini, Pexels License.

Guilin or Marbella?

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 Guilin for

  • prices
  • nature and the outdoors
  • culture and sights

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

Choose Marbella for

  • beaches
  • nightlife
  • shopping

What lies behind each score is written up on Marbella’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. Guilin 8, Marbella 76: Marbella leads by 68 points.
Food & drink. Guilin 45, Marbella 60: Marbella leads by 15 points.
Culture & sights. Guilin 40, Marbella 32: Guilin leads by 8 points.
Nightlife. Guilin 30, Marbella 64: Marbella leads by 34 points.
Nature & outdoors. Guilin 88, Marbella 70: Guilin leads by 18 points.
Day trips. Guilin 56, Marbella 77: Marbella leads by 21 points.
Good for families. Guilin 45, Marbella 70: Marbella leads by 25 points.
Getting around. Guilin 45, Marbella 38: Guilin leads by 7 points.
Shopping & style. Guilin 28, Marbella 58: Marbella leads by 30 points.
Affordability. Guilin 78, Marbella 30: Guilin leads by 48 points.
Live music & performing arts. Guilin and Marbella are level on 30.
Wellness & relaxation. Guilin 40, Marbella 52: Marbella leads by 12 points.
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What lies behind each score is written up on the two cities’ own pages: Guilin and Marbella.

Your match

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

Guilin
44match

Wins on prices and nature and the outdoors with your weighting.

Marbella
Best match
55match

Wins on beaches and nightlife with your weighting.

What matters to you?

When should you go?

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

Guilin in July

33 °Cdaytime high
25 °Cnight-time low
248 mmrain in the month
No recordsunshine a day
No seasea
14 hdaylight a day

Marbella in July

31 °Cdaytime high
21 °Cnight-time low
0 mmrain in the month
12 hsunshine a day
21 °Csea
14 hdaylight a day

Daytime high, °C

0°10°20°30°40°JFMAMJJASOND

Rainfall in the month, mm

0100200300400500JFMAMJJASOND
GuilinMarbella

Where the figures come from

Marbella's temperatures are measured 40 km from the centre, at Malaga / Aeropuerto.

Marbella 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. Guilin: 1991-2020 normals, Guilin (7.6 km from centre). Marbella: 1991-2020 normals, Malaga / Aeropuerto (39.7 km from centre).

Before you go

MeasureGuilinMarbella
Official languagePutonghuaSpanish
CurrencyYuan Renminbi (CNY)Euro (EUR)
SocketsACI220 V, 50 HzCF230 V, 50 Hz
Driving sideRightRight
Time zoneUTC+8UTC+1, UTC+2 in summer
Emergency numberPolice 110, ambulance 120, fire 119112
Elevation153 m22 m
Main airportGuilin Liangjiang International Airport (KWL)25 km from centre43 non-stop destinationsMálaga-Costa del Sol Airport (AGP)39 km from centre166 non-stop destinations
Public holidays this year6 days12 days

By the numbers

MeasureGuilinMarbella
City population4,931,137159,786
People per km²-1,398
Museums within 10 km16
UNESCO World Heritage sites within 50 km10
Swim season, months above 21 °C-3 months

Where else could you go?

Every comparison below shares a destination with this one, so you can follow Guilin or Marbella 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. 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. Sea surface temperature from NOAA OISST v2.1, NOAA Physical Sciences Laboratory. Tourism statistics from Eurostat, © European Union, reused under CC BY 4.0. 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.