VacationSelector
Turquoise water off Giftun Island, Hurghada
HurghadaTurquoise water off Giftun Island
Fishermen on the rocks at Playa Santa Teresa at sunset, Santa Teresa, Costa Rica
Santa Teresa, Costa RicaFishermen on the rocks at Playa Santa Teresa at sunset

Photos: Hurghada by Andrey Korchagin, CC BY-SA 2.0, cropped; Santa Teresa, Costa Rica by Christopher Crouzet, CC BY-SA 4.0, cropped.

Hurghada or Santa Teresa, Costa Rica?

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 Hurghada for

  • prices
  • families
  • day trips

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

Choose Santa Teresa, Costa Rica for

  • wellness
  • food and drink
  • nature and the outdoors

What lies behind each score is written up on Santa Teresa, Costa Rica’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. Hurghada and Santa Teresa, Costa Rica are level on 84.
Food & drink. Hurghada 34, Santa Teresa, Costa Rica 40: Santa Teresa, Costa Rica leads by 6 points.
Culture & sights. Hurghada 14, Santa Teresa, Costa Rica 4: Hurghada leads by 10 points.
Nightlife. Hurghada 40, Santa Teresa, Costa Rica 30: Hurghada leads by 10 points.
Nature & outdoors. Hurghada 72, Santa Teresa, Costa Rica 78: Santa Teresa, Costa Rica leads by 6 points.
Day trips. Hurghada 30, Santa Teresa, Costa Rica 12: Hurghada leads by 18 points.
Good for families. Hurghada 62, Santa Teresa, Costa Rica 35: Hurghada leads by 27 points.
Getting around. Hurghada 22, Santa Teresa, Costa Rica 15: Hurghada leads by 7 points.
Shopping & style. Hurghada 24, Santa Teresa, Costa Rica 12: Hurghada leads by 12 points.
Affordability. Hurghada 80, Santa Teresa, Costa Rica 25: Hurghada leads by 55 points.
Live music & performing arts. Hurghada 10, Santa Teresa, Costa Rica 8: Hurghada leads by 2 points.
Wellness & relaxation. Hurghada 44, Santa Teresa, Costa Rica 70: Santa Teresa, Costa Rica leads by 26 points.
0255075100

What lies behind each score is written up on the two cities’ own pages: Hurghada and Santa Teresa, Costa Rica.

Your match

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

Hurghada
Best match
43match

Wins on prices and families with your weighting.

Santa Teresa, Costa Rica
34match

Wins on wellness and food and drink with your weighting.

What matters to you?

When should you go?

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

Hurghada in July

37 °Cdaytime high
28 °Cnight-time low
0 mmrain in the month
No recordsunshine a day
28 °Csea
14 hdaylight a day

Santa Teresa, Costa Rica in July

33 °Cdaytime high
23 °Cnight-time low
218 mmrain in the month
5 hsunshine a day
29 °Csea
13 hdaylight a day

Daytime high, °C

0°10°20°30°40°JFMAMJJASOND

Rainfall in the month, mm

0100200300400500JFMAMJJASOND
HurghadaSanta Teresa, Costa Rica

Where the figures come from

Santa Teresa, Costa Rica's temperatures are measured 52 km from the centre, at Puntarenas.

Santa Teresa, Costa Rica 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. Hurghada: 1991-2020 normals, Hurguada (15.2 km from centre). Santa Teresa, Costa Rica: 1961-1990 (rainfall 1991-2020) normals, Puntarenas (51.5 km from centre).

Before you go

MeasureHurghadaSanta Teresa, Costa Rica
Official languageArabicSpanish
CurrencyEgyptian Pound (EGP)Costa Rican Colon (CRC)
SocketsCF220 V, 50 HzAB120 V, 60 Hz
Driving sideRightRight
Time zoneUTC+2, UTC+3 in summerUTC-6
Emergency numberPolice 122, ambulance 123, fire 180911
Elevation11 m19 m
Main airportHurghada International Airport (HRG)9 km from centre111 non-stop destinationsDaniel Oduber Quirós International Airport (LIR)113 km from centre30 non-stop destinations
Public holidays this year15 days11 days

By the numbers

MeasureHurghadaSanta Teresa, Costa Rica
City population214,247-
Museums within 10 km10
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 Hurghada or Santa Teresa, Costa Rica 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). 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. Ground elevations sampled from the Mapzen terrain tiles via OpenTopoData, merging SRTM, ASTER, NED, EU-DEM and national sources. Daylight hours computed from each destination's latitude using the NOAA solar position algorithm. Exchange rates via Frankfurter, based on European Central Bank reference rates.

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.