VacationSelector
Rocks and beach in Tangolunda Bay, Huatulco
HuatulcoRocks and beach in Tangolunda Bay
Playa Tamarindo, Tamarindo
TamarindoPlaya Tamarindo

Photos: Huatulco by Gzzz, CC BY-SA 4.0, cropped; Tamarindo by Jarle Naustvik, CC BY 2.0, cropped.

Huatulco or Tamarindo?

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

  • prices
  • day trips
  • culture and sights

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

Choose Tamarindo for

  • nightlife
  • live music and the arts

What lies behind each score is written up on Tamarindo’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, Tamarindo 85: Huatulco leads by 1 points.
Food & drink. Huatulco 44, Tamarindo 38: Huatulco leads by 6 points.
Culture & sights. Huatulco 15, Tamarindo 5: Huatulco leads by 10 points.
Nightlife. Huatulco 24, Tamarindo 45: Tamarindo leads by 21 points.
Nature & outdoors. Huatulco and Tamarindo are level on 76.
Day trips. Huatulco 40, Tamarindo 28: Huatulco leads by 12 points.
Good for families. Huatulco 56, Tamarindo 55: Huatulco leads by 1 points.
Getting around. Huatulco 33, Tamarindo 32: Huatulco leads by 1 points.
Shopping & style. Huatulco 20, Tamarindo 18: Huatulco leads by 2 points.
Affordability. Huatulco 62, Tamarindo 36: Huatulco leads by 26 points.
Live music & performing arts. Huatulco 9, Tamarindo 10: Tamarindo leads by 1 points.
Wellness & relaxation. Huatulco 52, Tamarindo 45: Huatulco leads by 7 points.
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What lies behind each score is written up on the two cities’ own pages: Huatulco and Tamarindo.

Your match

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

Huatulco
Best match
43match

Wins on prices and day trips with your weighting.

Tamarindo
39match

Wins on nightlife and live music and the arts 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

Tamarindo in July

33 °Cdaytime high
23 °Cnight-time low
129 mmrain in the month
No recordsunshine a day
29 °Csea
13 hdaylight a day

Daytime high, °C

0°10°20°30°40°JFMAMJJASOND

Rainfall in the month, mm

0100200300400JFMAMJJASOND
HuatulcoTamarindo

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.

Tamarindo's temperatures are measured 54 km from the centre, at Liberia.

Tamarindo 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). Tamarindo: 1991-2020 normals, Liberia (53.8 km from centre).

Before you go

MeasureHuatulcoTamarindo
Official languageSpanish, Nahuatl, Yucatec MayaSpanish
CurrencyMexican Peso (MXN)Costa Rican Colon (CRC)
SocketsAB127 V, 60 HzAB120 V, 60 Hz
Driving sideRightRight
Time zoneUTC-6UTC-6
Emergency number911911
Elevation220 m27 m
Main airportBahías de Huatulco International Airport (HUX)15 km from centre13 non-stop destinationsDaniel Oduber Quirós International Airport (LIR)43 km from centre30 non-stop destinations
Public holidays this year9 days11 days

By the numbers

MeasureHuatulcoTamarindo
City population7,4097,132
People per km²-57
Museums within 10 km00
UNESCO World Heritage sites within 50 km00
Swim season, months above 21 °C12 months12 months

Where else could you go?

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