VacationSelector

Kathmandu or Tirana?

Two destinations compared in twelve categories, each scored against the same fixed benchmark cities. Weight what matters to you and the verdict follows.

Swayambhunath with its prayer flags, Kathmandu
Kathmandu

Photo: Nabin K. Sapkota, CC BY-SA 4.0, cropped

The Great Mosque with the mountains behind, Tirana
Tirana

Photo: Bjørn Christian Tørrissen, CC BY-SA 4.0, cropped

Your match

Too close to call, 1 point apart

Kathmandu
48
match

Wins on culture and sights and shopping with your weighting.

Tirana
49
match

Wins on beaches and getting around with your weighting.

What matters to you?

Pick a travel style or drag the sliders. The match scores above update as you do.

Scoreboard

Our verdict on each category, scored 0 to 100 against fixed benchmark cities.

KathmanduTirana
Beaches & swimming. Tirana leads by 42 points.42
Food & drink. Tirana leads by 2 points.2
Culture & sights. Kathmandu leads by 40 points.40
Nightlife. Tirana leads by 22 points.22
Nature & outdoors. Kathmandu leads by 8 points.8
Day trips. Tirana leads by 8 points.8
Good for families. Tirana leads by 20 points.20
Getting around. Tirana leads by 29 points.29
Shopping & style. Kathmandu leads by 23 points.23
Affordability. Kathmandu leads by 21 points.21
Live music & performing arts. Tirana leads by 4 points.4
Wellness & relaxation. Kathmandu leads by 18 points.18
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What lies behind each score is written up on the two cities’ own pages: Kathmandu and Tirana.

When should you go?

Pick the month you can travel and see both cities side by side. The climate figures are measured averages, not a forecast.

Climate figures for July
JulyKathmanduTirana
Daytime high29 °C31 °C
Night-time low20 °C17 °C
Rainfall in the month384 mm43 mm
Sunshine4 hours a day12 hours a day
Sea temperatureNo sea24 °C
Daylight14 hours a day15 hours a day

The whole year

Each row is shaded against that destination’s own year, so the deepest cell is its best month for that figure and the palest its weakest. Shades are not comparable between the two rows.

J
F
M
A
M
J
J
A
S
O
N
D
Daytime high, °C
Kathmandu
19
22
26
29
29
29
29
29
28
27
23
20
Tirana
12
13
16
19
24
28
31
31
27
22
17
13
Sea temperature, °C
Kathmandu
No coastline within reach
Tirana
15
14
14
16
19
23
24
25
24
21
19
16
Rainfall, mm
Kathmandu
16
23
37
57
113
260
384
317
211
48
7
10
Tirana
143
117
116
103
84
66
43
55
78
114
172
148
Daylight, hours per day
Kathmandu
11
11
12
13
14
14
14
13
12
12
11
10
Tirana
10
11
12
13
15
15
15
14
13
11
10
9
Sunshine, hours per day
Kathmandu
6
6
7
7
7
5
4
4
5
7
7
7
Tirana
4
4
5
6
9
10
12
11
9
7
4
3

Temperature and rainfall are climate normals, averaged over the years shown. Kathmandu: 1991-2020 normals, Kathmandu Airport (4.7 km from centre). Tirana: 1961-1990 normals, Tirana (3 km from centre).

WorseBetter

Getting there

Flying fromKathmanduTirana
IstanbulIST, SAW
6 h 55 m
€583-665
1 stop
KTM · 4 km
1 h 35 m
€100-109
TIA · 13 km
DubaiDXB, DWC
4 h 10 m
€400-446
KTM · 4 km
5 h 5 m
no fares
TIA · 13 km
RiyadhRUH
5 h 10 m
no fares
KTM · 4 km
4 h 20 m
no fares
TIA · 13 km

The busiest departure cities for these two, with a place kept for each other part of the world. Busiest means arriving passengers where an official count exists, and where none does, the number of non-stop services flown: official route statistics are published by the European reporting countries and by nobody else, so a table ranked on them alone would offer a reader in New York or Tokyo ten European cities. Flying times are estimated from the distance between airports, and every row is a city flown non-stop to both. Where the typical offer connects anyway, the stops are shown. Under each figure is the airport the flight lands at and how far that is from the centre, because the nearest airport is not always the one a route is flown to. Where both columns name the same airport it is one flight, and the difference between the two is the distance printed beside it. Typical return fares for 2026-10 to 2026-12, cached market data up to 7 days old. The figure is the middle half of the offers found, so a single price means they agreed and a range means they did not; for a typical route that middle half spans about a quarter of the median, and for the least settled routes rather more than the median itself.

Before you go

MeasureKathmanduTirana
Official languageNepaliAlbanian
CurrencyNepalese Rupee (NPR)Lek (ALL)
SocketsCM230 V, 50 HzCF220 V, 50 Hz
Driving sideLeftRight
Time zoneUTC+5:45UTC+1, UTC+2 in summer
Emergency numberPolice 100, ambulance 102, fire 101112
Elevation1,300 m110 m
Main airportTribhuvan International Airport (KTM)4 km from centre38 non-stop destinationsTirana International Airport Mother Teresa (TIA)13 km from centre121 non-stop destinations
Public holidays this year-14 days

By the numbers

MeasureKathmanduTirana
City population845,767389,323
People per km²17,1219,314
Museums within 10 km911
UNESCO World Heritage sites within 50 km10
Swim season, months above 21 °C-5 months

Where else could you go?

Every comparison below shares a destination with this one, so you can follow Kathmandu or Tirana somewhere new.

Browse every destination

Sources

Structured data from Wikidata (CC0). Weather data by Meteostat. Meteorological data provided by NOAA, DWD and others. Airport data from OurAirports (public domain). 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. Sea surface temperature from NOAA OISST v2.1, NOAA Physical Sciences Laboratory. Tourism statistics from Eurostat, © European Union, reused under CC BY 4.0. Public holidays from Nager.Date (MIT). Daylight hours computed from each destination's latitude using the NOAA solar position algorithm. Typical fares from Travelpayouts (Aviasales data). Route-level air passenger statistics from Eurostat, © European Union, reused under CC BY 4.0. 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 and flight figures are measured. How the scores are set. Snapshot generated 2026-10-27. Typical prices can be up to 7 days old. Daily budgets are estimates from country price levels.