VacationSelector
The clock tower in the old town, Kotor
KotorThe clock tower in the old town
The lighthouse and harbour at Sharm el-Sheikh, Sharm el-Sheikh
Sharm el-SheikhThe lighthouse and harbour at Sharm el-Sheikh

Photos: Kotor by Muhammed Fatih Beki, Pexels License; Sharm el-Sheikh by Tanya Dedyukhina, CC BY 3.0, cropped.

Kotor or Sharm el-Sheikh?

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

  • culture and sights
  • day trips
  • getting around

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

Choose Sharm el-Sheikh for

  • beaches
  • families
  • wellness

What lies behind each score is written up on Sharm el-Sheikh’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, Sharm el-Sheikh 87: Sharm el-Sheikh leads by 30 points.
Food & drink. Kotor 37, Sharm el-Sheikh 30: Kotor leads by 7 points.
Culture & sights. Kotor 55, Sharm el-Sheikh 12: Kotor leads by 43 points.
Nightlife. Kotor 30, Sharm el-Sheikh 42: Sharm el-Sheikh leads by 12 points.
Nature & outdoors. Kotor 80, Sharm el-Sheikh 82: Sharm el-Sheikh leads by 2 points.
Day trips. Kotor 72, Sharm el-Sheikh 30: Kotor leads by 42 points.
Good for families. Kotor 36, Sharm el-Sheikh 62: Sharm el-Sheikh leads by 26 points.
Getting around. Kotor 48, Sharm el-Sheikh 22: Kotor leads by 26 points.
Shopping & style. Kotor 20, Sharm el-Sheikh 25: Sharm el-Sheikh leads by 5 points.
Affordability. Kotor 57, Sharm el-Sheikh 74: Sharm el-Sheikh leads by 17 points.
Live music & performing arts. Kotor 20, Sharm el-Sheikh 10: Kotor leads by 10 points.
Wellness & relaxation. Kotor 24, Sharm el-Sheikh 50: Sharm el-Sheikh leads by 26 points.
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What lies behind each score is written up on the two cities’ own pages: Kotor and Sharm el-Sheikh.

Your match

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

Too close to call, 1 point apart

Kotor
45match

Wins on culture and sights and day trips with your weighting.

Sharm el-Sheikh
44match

Wins on beaches and families 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

Sharm el-Sheikh in July

38 °Cdaytime high
28 °Cnight-time low
0 mmrain in the month
No recordsunshine a day
28 °Csea
14 hdaylight a day

Daytime high, °C

0°10°20°30°40°JFMAMJJASOND

Rainfall in the month, mm

050100150200250JFMAMJJASOND
KotorSharm el-Sheikh

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.

Sharm el-Sheikh has no weather station within reach, so its figures come from a gridded climate model rather than a measured record, and read a broad area rather than the city itself.

Temperature and rainfall are climate normals, averaged over the years shown. Kotor: 1991-2020 normals, Tivat (4.2 km from centre). Sharm el-Sheikh: 2001-2020 normals, NASA POWER reanalysis grid, no weather station within 90 km.

Before you go

MeasureKotorSharm el-Sheikh
Official languageMontenegrinArabic
CurrencyEuro (EUR)Egyptian Pound (EGP)
SocketsCF230 V, 50 HzCF220 V, 50 Hz
Driving sideRightRight
Time zoneUTC+1, UTC+2 in summerUTC+2, UTC+3 in summer
Emergency number112Police 122, ambulance 123, fire 180
Elevation10 m1 m
Main airportTivat Airport (TIV)5 km from centre42 non-stop destinationsSharm El Sheikh International Airport (SSH)16 km from centre112 non-stop destinations
Public holidays this year-15 days

By the numbers

MeasureKotorSharm el-Sheikh
City population56273,000
Museums within 10 km31
UNESCO World Heritage sites within 50 km30
Swim season, months above 21 °C5 months12 months

Where else could you go?

Every comparison below shares a destination with this one, so you can follow Kotor or Sharm el-Sheikh 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. Temperature and rainfall for destinations with no weather station are from the NASA POWER 2001-2020 climatology, derived from MERRA-2. 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.