VacationSelector
Rocks and beach in Tangolunda Bay, Huatulco
HuatulcoRocks and beach in Tangolunda Bay
The cathedral above the old town, Santiago de Compostela
Santiago de CompostelaThe cathedral above the old town

Photos: Huatulco by Gzzz, CC BY-SA 4.0, cropped; Santiago de Compostela by Luis Miguel Bugallo Sánchez (Lmbuga), CC BY-SA 3.0, cropped.

Huatulco or Santiago de Compostela?

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
  • nature and the outdoors
  • families

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

Choose Santiago de Compostela for

  • culture and sights
  • getting around
  • day trips

What lies behind each score is written up on Santiago de Compostela’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, Santiago de Compostela 32: Huatulco leads by 54 points.
Food & drink. Huatulco 44, Santiago de Compostela 68: Santiago de Compostela leads by 24 points.
Culture & sights. Huatulco 15, Santiago de Compostela 70: Santiago de Compostela leads by 55 points.
Nightlife. Huatulco 24, Santiago de Compostela 45: Santiago de Compostela leads by 21 points.
Nature & outdoors. Huatulco 76, Santiago de Compostela 62: Huatulco leads by 14 points.
Day trips. Huatulco 40, Santiago de Compostela 72: Santiago de Compostela leads by 32 points.
Good for families. Huatulco 56, Santiago de Compostela 42: Huatulco leads by 14 points.
Getting around. Huatulco 33, Santiago de Compostela 70: Santiago de Compostela leads by 37 points.
Shopping & style. Huatulco 20, Santiago de Compostela 35: Santiago de Compostela leads by 15 points.
Affordability. Huatulco 62, Santiago de Compostela 64: Santiago de Compostela leads by 2 points.
Live music & performing arts. Huatulco 9, Santiago de Compostela 40: Santiago de Compostela leads by 31 points.
Wellness & relaxation. Huatulco 52, Santiago de Compostela 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 Santiago de Compostela.

Your match

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

Huatulco
43match

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

Santiago de Compostela
Best match
54match

Wins on culture and sights and getting around 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

Santiago de Compostela in July

25 °Cdaytime high
13 °Cnight-time low
41 mmrain in the month
8 hsunshine a day
17 °Csea
15 hdaylight a day

Daytime high, °C

0°10°20°30°40°JFMAMJJASOND

Rainfall in the month, mm

0100200300JFMAMJJASOND
HuatulcoSantiago de Compostela

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.

Temperature and rainfall are climate normals, averaged over the years shown. Huatulco: 1991-2020 normals, Puerto Angel, Oax. (42.2 km from centre). Santiago de Compostela: 1991-2020 normals, Santiago / Labacolla (8.4 km from centre).

Before you go

MeasureHuatulcoSantiago de Compostela
Official languageSpanish, Nahuatl, Yucatec MayaSpanish
CurrencyMexican Peso (MXN)Euro (EUR)
SocketsAB127 V, 60 HzCF230 V, 50 Hz
Driving sideRightRight
Time zoneUTC-6UTC+1, UTC+2 in summer
Emergency number911112
Elevation220 m260 m
Main airportBahías de Huatulco International Airport (HUX)15 km from centre13 non-stop destinationsSantiago-Rosalía de Castro Airport (SCQ)10 km from centre29 non-stop destinations
Public holidays this year9 days13 days

By the numbers

MeasureHuatulcoSantiago de Compostela
City population7,409100,965
People per km²-459
Museums within 10 km06
UNESCO World Heritage sites within 50 km02
Swim season, months above 21 °C12 monthsNone

Where else could you go?

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