VacationSelector
Rocks and beach in Tangolunda Bay, Huatulco
HuatulcoRocks and beach in Tangolunda Bay
The lighthouse in the Paphos Archaeological Park, Paphos
PaphosThe lighthouse in the Paphos Archaeological Park

Photos: Huatulco by Gzzz, CC BY-SA 4.0, cropped; Paphos by Nikodem Nijaki, CC BY-SA 3.0, cropped.

Huatulco or Paphos?

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 Huatulco for

  • beaches
  • prices
  • wellness

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

Choose Paphos for

  • culture and sights
  • day trips
  • nightlife

What lies behind each score is written up on Paphos’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. Huatulco 86, Paphos 76: Huatulco leads by 10 points.
Food & drink. Huatulco 44, Paphos 45: Paphos leads by 1 points.
Culture & sights. Huatulco 15, Paphos 62: Paphos leads by 47 points.
Nightlife. Huatulco 24, Paphos 38: Paphos leads by 14 points.
Nature & outdoors. Huatulco 76, Paphos 70: Huatulco leads by 6 points.
Day trips. Huatulco 40, Paphos 64: Paphos leads by 24 points.
Good for families. Huatulco 56, Paphos 68: Paphos leads by 12 points.
Getting around. Huatulco 33, Paphos 40: Paphos leads by 7 points.
Shopping & style. Huatulco 20, Paphos 25: Paphos leads by 5 points.
Affordability. Huatulco 62, Paphos 52: Huatulco leads by 10 points.
Live music & performing arts. Huatulco 9, Paphos 22: Paphos leads by 13 points.
Wellness & relaxation. Huatulco 52, Paphos 42: Huatulco leads by 10 points.
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What lies behind each score is written up on the two cities’ own pages: Huatulco and Paphos.

Your match

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

Huatulco
43match

Wins on beaches and prices with your weighting.

Paphos
Best match
50match

Wins on culture and sights and day trips with your weighting.

What matters to you?

When should you go?

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

Huatulco in July

33 °Cdaytime high
24 °Cnight-time low
156 mmrain in the month
7 hsunshine a day
30 °Csea
13 hdaylight a day

Paphos in July

30 °Cdaytime high
21 °Cnight-time low
1 mmrain in the month
No recordsunshine a day
27 °Csea
14 hdaylight a day

Daytime high, °C

0°10°20°30°40°JFMAMJJASOND

Rainfall in the month, mm

0100200300JFMAMJJASOND
HuatulcoPaphos

Where the figures come from

Huatulco's temperatures are measured 42 km from the centre, at Puerto Angel, Oax..

Huatulco's station stands 177 m below the city centre, so the centre is likely a little cooler than the figures say.

Huatulco 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.

Paphos 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. Huatulco: 1991-2020 normals, Puerto Angel, Oax. (42.2 km from centre). Paphos: 1991-2020 normals, Paphos Airport (8.4 km from centre).

Before you go

MeasureHuatulcoPaphos
Official languageSpanish, Nahuatl, Yucatec MayaTurkish, Greek, Modern Greek
CurrencyMexican Peso (MXN)Euro (EUR)
SocketsAB127 V, 60 HzG240 V, 50 Hz
Driving sideRightLeft
Time zoneUTC-6UTC+2, UTC+3 in summer
Emergency number911112
Elevation220 m72 m
Main airportBahías de Huatulco International Airport (HUX)15 km from centre13 non-stop destinationsPaphos International Airport (PFO)8 km from centre59 non-stop destinations
Public holidays this year9 days17 days

By the numbers

MeasureHuatulcoPaphos
City population7,40935,961
People per km²-1,987
Museums within 10 km04
UNESCO World Heritage sites within 50 km02
Swim season, months above 21 °C12 months6 months

Where else could you go?

Every comparison below shares a destination with this one, so you can follow Huatulco or Paphos 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. 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.