VacationSelector
The pagoda at Kiyomizu-dera, Kyoto
KyotoThe pagoda at Kiyomizu-dera
The SkyWheel by the beach, Myrtle Beach
Myrtle BeachThe SkyWheel by the beach

Photos: Kyoto by Bert Mulder, Pexels License; Myrtle Beach by The ed17, CC BY-SA 4.0, cropped.

Kyoto or Myrtle Beach?

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 Kyoto for

  • culture and sights
  • getting around
  • food and drink

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

Choose Myrtle Beach for

  • beaches
  • families
  • nightlife

What lies behind each score is written up on Myrtle Beach’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. Kyoto 15, Myrtle Beach 84: Myrtle Beach leads by 69 points.
Food & drink. Kyoto 85, Myrtle Beach 38: Kyoto leads by 47 points.
Culture & sights. Kyoto 96, Myrtle Beach 20: Kyoto leads by 76 points.
Nightlife. Kyoto 35, Myrtle Beach 42: Myrtle Beach leads by 7 points.
Nature & outdoors. Kyoto 70, Myrtle Beach 46: Kyoto leads by 24 points.
Day trips. Kyoto 96, Myrtle Beach 50: Kyoto leads by 46 points.
Good for families. Kyoto 68, Myrtle Beach 80: Myrtle Beach leads by 12 points.
Getting around. Kyoto 72, Myrtle Beach 18: Kyoto leads by 54 points.
Shopping & style. Kyoto 72, Myrtle Beach 38: Kyoto leads by 34 points.
Affordability. Kyoto 50, Myrtle Beach 52: Myrtle Beach leads by 2 points.
Live music & performing arts. Kyoto 60, Myrtle Beach 30: Kyoto leads by 30 points.
Wellness & relaxation. Kyoto 70, Myrtle Beach 28: Kyoto leads by 42 points.
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What lies behind each score is written up on the two cities’ own pages: Kyoto and Myrtle Beach.

Your match

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

Kyoto
Best match
66match

Wins on culture and sights and getting around with your weighting.

Myrtle Beach
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.

Kyoto in July

31 °Cdaytime high
23 °Cnight-time low
225 mmrain in the month
6 hsunshine a day
25 °Csea
14 hdaylight a day

Myrtle Beach in July

31 °Cdaytime high
24 °Cnight-time low
172 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
KyotoMyrtle Beach

Where the figures come from

Kyoto's sunshine is measured 43 km from the centre, at Osaka.

Myrtle Beach 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. Kyoto: 1971-2000 (sunshine 1991-2020) normals, Kyoto (3.2 km from centre). Myrtle Beach: 1971-2000 (rainfall 1991-2020) normals, Myrtle Beach Air Force Base (5.5 km from centre).

Before you go

MeasureKyotoMyrtle Beach
Official languageJapanese-
CurrencyYen (JPY)US Dollar (USD)
SocketsAB100 V, 50 and 60 Hz depending on the regionAB120 V, 60 Hz
Driving sideLeftRight
Time zoneUTC+9UTC-5, UTC-4 in summer
Emergency numberPolice 110, fire 119911
Elevation51 m8 m
Main airportKansai International Airport (KIX)81 km from centre62 non-stop destinationsMyrtle Beach International Airport (MYR)5 km from centre60 non-stop destinations
Public holidays this year16 days12 days

By the numbers

MeasureKyotoMyrtle Beach
City population1,463,72335,682
People per km²1,768591
Museums within 10 km772
UNESCO World Heritage sites within 50 km40
Swim season, months above 21 °C5 months6 months

Where else could you go?

Every comparison below shares a destination with this one, so you can follow Kyoto or Myrtle Beach 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). 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.