VacationSelector
Painted wooden houses under palms in Key West, Key West
Key WestPainted wooden houses under palms in Key West
The railway viaduct over the canal, Castlefield, Manchester
ManchesterThe railway viaduct over the canal, Castlefield

Photos: Key West by Dominik Gryzbon, Pexels License; Manchester by IIya Kuzhekin, CC BY 3.0, cropped.

Key West or Manchester?

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 Key West for

  • beaches
  • wellness

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

Choose Manchester for

  • day trips
  • live music and the arts
  • shopping

What lies behind each score is written up on Manchester’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. Key West 60, Manchester 9: Key West leads by 51 points.
Food & drink. Key West 45, Manchester 51: Manchester leads by 6 points.
Culture & sights. Key West 40, Manchester 50: Manchester leads by 10 points.
Nightlife. Key West 62, Manchester 72: Manchester leads by 10 points.
Nature & outdoors. Key West 62, Manchester 64: Manchester leads by 2 points.
Day trips. Key West 28, Manchester 77: Manchester leads by 49 points.
Good for families. Key West 40, Manchester 58: Manchester leads by 18 points.
Getting around. Key West 62, Manchester 68: Manchester leads by 6 points.
Shopping & style. Key West 30, Manchester 62: Manchester leads by 32 points.
Affordability. Key West 15, Manchester 42: Manchester leads by 27 points.
Live music & performing arts. Key West 38, Manchester 74: Manchester leads by 36 points.
Wellness & relaxation. Key West 40, Manchester 15: Key West leads by 25 points.
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What lies behind each score is written up on the two cities’ own pages: Key West and Manchester.

Your match

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

Key West
44match

Wins on beaches and wellness with your weighting.

Manchester
Best match
54match

Wins on day trips 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.

Key West in July

32 °Cdaytime high
27 °Cnight-time low
84 mmrain in the month
No recordsunshine a day
30 °Csea
14 hdaylight a day

Manchester in July

21 °Cdaytime high
13 °Cnight-time low
60 mmrain in the month
6 hsunshine a day
16 °Csea
17 hdaylight a day

Daytime high, °C

0°10°20°30°40°JFMAMJJASOND

Rainfall in the month, mm

050100150JFMAMJJASOND
Key WestManchester

Where the figures come from

Key West's temperatures are measured 69 km from the centre, at Key West Airport.

Key West 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. Key West: 1991-2020 normals, Key West Airport (69.1 km from centre). Manchester: 1991-2020 normals, Manchester Airport (14.8 km from centre).

Before you go

MeasureKey WestManchester
Official language-English
CurrencyUS Dollar (USD)Pound Sterling (GBP)
SocketsAB120 V, 60 HzG230 V, 50 Hz
Driving sideRightLeft
Time zoneUTC-5, UTC-4 in summerUTC, UTC+1 in summer
Emergency number911112 or 999
Elevation4 m38 m
Main airportKey West International Airport (EYW)2 km from centre24 non-stop destinationsManchester Airport (MAN)15 km from centre211 non-stop destinations
Public holidays this year11 days8 days

By the numbers

MeasureKey WestManchester
City population26,444547,627
People per km²1,4074,737
Museums within 10 km728
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 Key West or Manchester 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 2026-10-31. Daily budgets are estimates from country price levels.