VacationSelector
The Blue Mosque, Istanbul
IstanbulThe Blue Mosque
The church of San Estanislao at Altos de Chavón, La Romana
La RomanaThe church of San Estanislao at Altos de Chavón

Photos: Istanbul by AXP Photography, Pexels License; La Romana by Edgar El, CC BY 3.0, cropped.

Istanbul or La Romana?

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 Istanbul for

  • culture and sights
  • shopping
  • food and drink

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

Choose La Romana for

  • beaches
  • nature and the outdoors
  • families

What lies behind each score is written up on La Romana’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. Istanbul 45, La Romana 84: La Romana leads by 39 points.
Food & drink. Istanbul 87, La Romana 38: Istanbul leads by 49 points.
Culture & sights. Istanbul 90, La Romana 24: Istanbul leads by 66 points.
Nightlife. Istanbul 77, La Romana 30: Istanbul leads by 47 points.
Nature & outdoors. Istanbul 52, La Romana 62: La Romana leads by 10 points.
Day trips. Istanbul 55, La Romana 52: Istanbul leads by 3 points.
Good for families. Istanbul 55, La Romana 56: La Romana leads by 1 points.
Getting around. Istanbul 62, La Romana 24: Istanbul leads by 38 points.
Shopping & style. Istanbul 86, La Romana 28: Istanbul leads by 58 points.
Affordability. Istanbul 60, La Romana 50: Istanbul leads by 10 points.
Live music & performing arts. Istanbul 62, La Romana 17: Istanbul leads by 45 points.
Wellness & relaxation. Istanbul 75, La Romana 44: Istanbul leads by 31 points.
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What lies behind each score is written up on the two cities’ own pages: Istanbul and La Romana.

Your match

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

Istanbul
Best match
67match

Wins on culture and sights and shopping with your weighting.

La Romana
42match

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

What matters to you?

When should you go?

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

Istanbul in July

30 °Cdaytime high
21 °Cnight-time low
23 mmrain in the month
11 hsunshine a day
23 °Csea
15 hdaylight a day

La Romana in July

32 °Cdaytime high
24 °Cnight-time low
87 mmrain in the month
No recordsunshine a day
28 °Csea
13 hdaylight a day

Daytime high, °C

0°10°20°30°40°JFMAMJJASOND

Rainfall in the month, mm

050100150JFMAMJJASOND
IstanbulLa Romana

Where the figures come from

La Romana's temperatures are measured 65 km from the centre, at Punta Cana.

La Romana 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. Istanbul: 1991-2020 normals, Istanbul / Goztepe (9.9 km from centre). La Romana: 1993-2020 (rainfall 1991-2020) normals, Punta Cana (65.4 km from centre).

Before you go

MeasureIstanbulLa Romana
Official languageTurkishSpanish
CurrencyTurkish Lira (TRY)Dominican Peso (DOP)
SocketsCF230 V, 50 HzAB110 V, 60 Hz
Driving sideRightRight
Time zoneUTC+3UTC-4
Emergency number112911
Elevation100 m10 m
Main airportİstanbul Airport (IST)36 km from centre343 non-stop destinationsCasa De Campo International Airport (LRM)7 km from centre13 non-stop destinations
Public holidays this year14 days13 days

By the numbers

MeasureIstanbulLa Romana
City population15,655,924139,238
People per km²2,930512
Museums within 10 km730
UNESCO World Heritage sites within 50 km10
Swim season, months above 21 °C3 months12 months

Where else could you go?

Every comparison below shares a destination with this one, so you can follow Istanbul or La Romana 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). Tourism statistics from Eurostat, © European Union, reused under CC BY 4.0. 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.