VacationSelector
A cable car over the brick-red houses, La Paz
La PazA cable car over the brick-red houses
The beach and the bay with the mountains behind, Nuevo Vallarta
Nuevo VallartaThe beach and the bay with the mountains behind

Photos: La Paz by Arabsalam, CC BY 4.0, cropped; Nuevo Vallarta by Harpqueen, Public domain.

La Paz or Nuevo Vallarta?

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 La Paz for

  • prices
  • culture and sights
  • shopping

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

Choose Nuevo Vallarta for

  • beaches
  • families
  • wellness

What lies behind each score is written up on Nuevo Vallarta’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. La Paz 3, Nuevo Vallarta 84: Nuevo Vallarta leads by 81 points.
Food & drink. La Paz 50, Nuevo Vallarta 40: La Paz leads by 10 points.
Culture & sights. La Paz 52, Nuevo Vallarta 6: La Paz leads by 46 points.
Nightlife. La Paz 38, Nuevo Vallarta 16: La Paz leads by 22 points.
Nature & outdoors. La Paz 82, Nuevo Vallarta 75: La Paz leads by 7 points.
Day trips. La Paz 40, Nuevo Vallarta 58: Nuevo Vallarta leads by 18 points.
Good for families. La Paz 10, Nuevo Vallarta 73: Nuevo Vallarta leads by 63 points.
Getting around. La Paz 45, Nuevo Vallarta 25: La Paz leads by 20 points.
Shopping & style. La Paz 45, Nuevo Vallarta 22: La Paz leads by 23 points.
Affordability. La Paz 92, Nuevo Vallarta 45: La Paz leads by 47 points.
Live music & performing arts. La Paz 35, Nuevo Vallarta 18: La Paz leads by 17 points.
Wellness & relaxation. La Paz 12, Nuevo Vallarta 55: Nuevo Vallarta leads by 43 points.
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What lies behind each score is written up on the two cities’ own pages: La Paz and Nuevo Vallarta.

Your match

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

Too close to call, 1 point apart

La Paz
42match

Wins on prices and culture and sights with your weighting.

Nuevo Vallarta
43match

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.

La Paz in July

13 °Cdaytime high
-2 °Cnight-time low
16 mmrain in the month
No seasea
11 hdaylight a day

Nuevo Vallarta in July

34 °Cdaytime high
24 °Cnight-time low
206 mmrain in the month
30 °Csea
13 hdaylight a day

Daytime high, °C

0°10°20°30°40°JFMAMJJASOND

Rainfall in the month, mm

0100200300JFMAMJJASOND
La PazNuevo Vallarta

Where the figures come from

La Paz 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.

Nuevo Vallarta 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. La Paz: 2001-2020 normals, NASA POWER reanalysis grid, no weather station within 90 km. Nuevo Vallarta: 1991-2020 normals, TerraClimate 4 km grid at the town, no weather station within 90 km.

Before you go

MeasureLa PazNuevo Vallarta
Official languageSpanish, Aymara, Quechua, GuaraniSpanish, Nahuatl, Yucatec Maya
CurrencyBoliviano (BOB)Mexican Peso (MXN)
SocketsAC50 HzAB127 V, 60 Hz
Driving sideRightRight
Time zoneUTC-4UTC-6
Emergency number911911
Elevation3,640 m3 m
Main airportEl Alto International Airport (LPB)6 km from centre12 non-stop destinationsPuerto Vallarta International Airport (PVR)4 km from centre52 non-stop destinations
Public holidays this year12 days9 days

By the numbers

MeasureLa PazNuevo Vallarta
City population755,7321,301
People per km²1,601-
Museums within 10 km210
UNESCO World Heritage sites within 50 km11
Swim season, months above 21 °C-12 months

Where else could you go?

Every comparison below shares a destination with this one, so you can follow La Paz or Nuevo Vallarta somewhere new.

Browse every destination

Sources

Structured data from Wikidata (CC0). Temperature and rainfall for destinations with no weather station are from the NASA POWER 2001-2020 climatology, derived from MERRA-2. 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. Airport data from OurAirports (public domain). Public holidays from Nager.Date (MIT). 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. Ground elevations sampled from the Mapzen terrain tiles via OpenTopoData, merging SRTM, ASTER, NED, EU-DEM and national sources. Sea surface temperature from NOAA OISST v2.1, NOAA Physical Sciences Laboratory. Exchange rates via Frankfurter, based on European Central Bank reference rates. 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.