VacationSelector
The City Hall of Ho Chi Minh City, Ho Chi Minh City
Ho Chi Minh CityThe City Hall of Ho Chi Minh City
The Teatro Amazonas, Manaus
ManausThe Teatro Amazonas

Photos: Ho Chi Minh City by trungydang, CC BY 3.0, cropped; Manaus by Jardelsliumba, CC BY-SA 4.0, cropped.

Ho Chi Minh City or Manaus?

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 Ho Chi Minh City for

  • day trips
  • wellness
  • food and drink

What lies behind each score is written up on Ho Chi Minh City’s own page.

Choose Manaus for

  • nature and the outdoors
  • beaches
  • live music and the arts

What lies behind each score is written up on Manaus’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. Ho Chi Minh City 18, Manaus 38: Manaus leads by 20 points.
Food & drink. Ho Chi Minh City 86, Manaus 56: Ho Chi Minh City leads by 30 points.
Culture & sights. Ho Chi Minh City 55, Manaus 46: Ho Chi Minh City leads by 9 points.
Nightlife. Ho Chi Minh City 70, Manaus 42: Ho Chi Minh City leads by 28 points.
Nature & outdoors. Ho Chi Minh City 28, Manaus 86: Manaus leads by 58 points.
Day trips. Ho Chi Minh City 58, Manaus 12: Ho Chi Minh City leads by 46 points.
Good for families. Ho Chi Minh City 40, Manaus 35: Ho Chi Minh City leads by 5 points.
Getting around. Ho Chi Minh City 38, Manaus 27: Ho Chi Minh City leads by 11 points.
Shopping & style. Ho Chi Minh City 55, Manaus 36: Ho Chi Minh City leads by 19 points.
Affordability. Ho Chi Minh City 92, Manaus 63: Ho Chi Minh City leads by 29 points.
Live music & performing arts. Ho Chi Minh City 40, Manaus 54: Manaus leads by 14 points.
Wellness & relaxation. Ho Chi Minh City 60, Manaus 20: Ho Chi Minh City leads by 40 points.
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What lies behind each score is written up on the two cities’ own pages: Ho Chi Minh City and Manaus.

Your match

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

Ho Chi Minh City
Best match
53match

Wins on day trips and wellness with your weighting.

Manaus
43match

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

What matters to you?

When should you go?

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

Ho Chi Minh City in July

33 °Cdaytime high
24 °Cnight-time low
285 mmrain in the month
No recordsunshine a day
29 °Csea
13 hdaylight a day

Manaus in July

33 °Cdaytime high
24 °Cnight-time low
74 mmrain in the month
7 hsunshine a day
No seasea
12 hdaylight a day

Daytime high, °C

0°10°20°30°40°JFMAMJJASOND

Rainfall in the month, mm

0100200300400JFMAMJJASOND
Ho Chi Minh CityManaus

Where the figures come from

Ho Chi Minh City 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. Ho Chi Minh City: 1991-2020 normals, Ho Chi Minh (6 km from centre). Manaus: 1991-2020 normals, Manaus (1.7 km from centre).

Before you go

MeasureHo Chi Minh CityManaus
Official languageVietnamesePortuguese
CurrencyDong (VND)Brazilian Real (BRL)
SocketsACFG220 V, 50 HzCN60 Hz
Driving sideRightRight
Time zoneUTC+7UTC-4
Emergency numberPolice 113, ambulance 115, fire 114Police 190, ambulance 192, fire 193
Elevation13 m92 m
Main airportTan Son Nhat International Airport (SGN)7 km from centre90 non-stop destinationsEduardo Gomes International Airport (MAO)9 km from centre21 non-stop destinations
Public holidays this year-14 days

By the numbers

MeasureHo Chi Minh CityManaus
City population14,002,5982,303,732
People per km²2,068202
Museums within 10 km913
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 Ho Chi Minh City or Manaus 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). 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. Public holidays from Nager.Date (MIT). Exchange rates via Frankfurter, based on European Central Bank reference rates. 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.