VacationSelector
The clock tower in the old town, Kotor
KotorThe clock tower in the old town
The Metropolitan Cathedral of San Jose, San Jose, Costa Rica
San Jose, Costa RicaThe Metropolitan Cathedral of San Jose

Photos: Kotor by Muhammed Fatih Beki, Pexels License; San Jose, Costa Rica by Bernard Gagnon, CC0.

Kotor or San Jose, 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 Kotor for

  • beaches
  • day trips
  • getting around

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

Choose San Jose, Costa Rica for

  • live music and the arts
  • shopping
  • nightlife

What lies behind each score is written up on San Jose, 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. Kotor 57, San Jose, Costa Rica 12: Kotor leads by 45 points.
Food & drink. Kotor 37, San Jose, Costa Rica 42: San Jose, Costa Rica leads by 5 points.
Culture & sights. Kotor 55, San Jose, Costa Rica 38: Kotor leads by 17 points.
Nightlife. Kotor 30, San Jose, Costa Rica 40: San Jose, Costa Rica leads by 10 points.
Nature & outdoors. Kotor 80, San Jose, Costa Rica 78: Kotor leads by 2 points.
Day trips. Kotor 72, San Jose, Costa Rica 52: Kotor leads by 20 points.
Good for families. Kotor 36, San Jose, Costa Rica 44: San Jose, Costa Rica leads by 8 points.
Getting around. Kotor 48, San Jose, Costa Rica 30: Kotor leads by 18 points.
Shopping & style. Kotor 20, San Jose, Costa Rica 36: San Jose, Costa Rica leads by 16 points.
Affordability. Kotor 57, San Jose, Costa Rica 54: Kotor leads by 3 points.
Live music & performing arts. Kotor 20, San Jose, Costa Rica 38: San Jose, Costa Rica leads by 18 points.
Wellness & relaxation. Kotor 24, San Jose, Costa Rica 28: San Jose, Costa Rica leads by 4 points.
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What lies behind each score is written up on the two cities’ own pages: Kotor and San Jose, Costa Rica.

Your match

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

Kotor
Best match
45match

Wins on beaches and day trips with your weighting.

San Jose, Costa Rica
41match

Wins on live music and the arts and shopping with your weighting.

What matters to you?

When should you go?

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

Kotor in July

31 °Cdaytime high
18 °Cnight-time low
39 mmrain in the month
11 hsunshine a day
25 °Csea
15 hdaylight a day

San Jose, Costa Rica in July

28 °Cdaytime high
19 °Cnight-time low
173 mmrain in the month
No recordsunshine a day
No seasea
13 hdaylight a day

Daytime high, °C

0°10°20°30°40°JFMAMJJASOND

Rainfall in the month, mm

0100200300400JFMAMJJASOND
KotorSan Jose, Costa Rica

Where the figures come from

Kotor 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.

Kotor's sunshine is measured 42 km from the centre, at Podgorica-Grad.

San Jose, Costa Rica's station stands 241 m below the city centre, so the centre is likely a little cooler than the figures say.

Temperature and rainfall are climate normals, averaged over the years shown. Kotor: 1991-2020 normals, Tivat (4.2 km from centre). San Jose, Costa Rica: 1991-2020 normals, Juan Santamaria (16.8 km from centre).

Before you go

MeasureKotorSan Jose, Costa Rica
Official languageMontenegrinSpanish
CurrencyEuro (EUR)Costa Rican Colon (CRC)
SocketsCF230 V, 50 HzAB120 V, 60 Hz
Driving sideRightRight
Time zoneUTC+1, UTC+2 in summerUTC-6
Emergency number112911
Elevation10 m1,161 m
Main airportTivat Airport (TIV)5 km from centre42 non-stop destinationsJuan Santamaría International Airport (SJO)16 km from centre49 non-stop destinations
Public holidays this year-11 days

By the numbers

MeasureKotorSan Jose, Costa Rica
City population562335,007
People per km²-7,511
Museums within 10 km39
UNESCO World Heritage sites within 50 km30
Swim season, months above 21 °C5 months-

Where else could you go?

Every comparison below shares a destination with this one, so you can follow Kotor or San Jose, Costa Rica somewhere new.

Browse every destination

Sources

Ground elevations sampled from the Mapzen terrain tiles via OpenTopoData, merging SRTM, ASTER, NED, EU-DEM and national 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. 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. Public holidays from Nager.Date (MIT). 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 2026-11-01. Daily budgets are estimates from country price levels.