VacationSelector
The floating torii of Itsukushima at Miyajima, Hiroshima
HiroshimaThe floating torii of Itsukushima at Miyajima
Flinders Street Station, Melbourne
MelbourneFlinders Street Station

Photos: Hiroshima by Guohua Song, Pexels License; Melbourne by Medelam, CC BY-SA 4.0, cropped.

Hiroshima or Melbourne?

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 Hiroshima for

  • prices
  • day trips
  • culture and sights

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

Choose Melbourne for

  • live music and the arts
  • nightlife
  • beaches

What lies behind each score is written up on Melbourne’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. Hiroshima 30, Melbourne 50: Melbourne leads by 20 points.
Food & drink. Hiroshima 66, Melbourne 75: Melbourne leads by 9 points.
Culture & sights. Hiroshima 60, Melbourne 57: Hiroshima leads by 3 points.
Nightlife. Hiroshima 45, Melbourne 75: Melbourne leads by 30 points.
Nature & outdoors. Hiroshima 62, Melbourne 70: Melbourne leads by 8 points.
Day trips. Hiroshima 80, Melbourne 62: Hiroshima leads by 18 points.
Good for families. Hiroshima 60, Melbourne 73: Melbourne leads by 13 points.
Getting around. Hiroshima 74, Melbourne 76: Melbourne leads by 2 points.
Shopping & style. Hiroshima 52, Melbourne 70: Melbourne leads by 18 points.
Affordability. Hiroshima 58, Melbourne 31: Hiroshima leads by 27 points.
Live music & performing arts. Hiroshima 38, Melbourne 72: Melbourne leads by 34 points.
Wellness & relaxation. Hiroshima 50, Melbourne 54: Melbourne leads by 4 points.
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What lies behind each score is written up on the two cities’ own pages: Hiroshima and Melbourne.

Your match

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

Hiroshima
56match

Wins on prices and day trips with your weighting.

Melbourne
Best match
64match

Wins on live music and the arts 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.

Hiroshima in July

31 °Cdaytime high
24 °Cnight-time low
299 mmrain in the month
6 hsunshine a day
24 °Csea
14 hdaylight a day

Melbourne in July

14 °Cdaytime high
6 °Cnight-time low
46 mmrain in the month
4 hsunshine a day
12 °Csea
10 hdaylight a day

Daytime high, °C

0°10°20°30°40°JFMAMJJASOND

Rainfall in the month, mm

0100200300JFMAMJJASOND
HiroshimaMelbourne

Temperature and rainfall are climate normals, averaged over the years shown. Hiroshima: 1991-2020 normals, Hiroshima (1.7 km from centre). Melbourne: 1991-2020 normals, Latrobe University / Kingsbury (13.1 km from centre).

Before you go

MeasureHiroshimaMelbourne
Official languageJapaneseEnglish
CurrencyYen (JPY)Australian Dollar (AUD)
SocketsAB100 V, 50 and 60 Hz depending on the regionI230 V, 50 Hz
Driving sideLeftLeft
Time zoneUTC+9UTC+10, UTC+11 in summer
Emergency numberPolice 110, fire 119000
Elevation3 m31 m
Main airportHiroshima Airport (HIJ)43 km from centre10 non-stop destinationsMelbourne Airport (MEL)19 km from centre69 non-stop destinations
Public holidays this year16 days13 days

By the numbers

MeasureHiroshimaMelbourne
City population1,198,0215,350,705
People per km²1,324535
Museums within 10 km1843
UNESCO World Heritage sites within 50 km21
Swim season, months above 21 °C4 monthsNone

Where else could you go?

Every comparison below shares a destination with this one, so you can follow Hiroshima or Melbourne somewhere new.

Browse every destination

Sources

Ground elevations sampled from the Mapzen terrain tiles via OpenTopoData, merging SRTM, ASTER, NED, EU-DEM and national 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.