VacationSelector
The church of San Estanislao at Altos de Chavón, La Romana
La RomanaThe church of San Estanislao at Altos de Chavón
The skyline over the Schuylkill, Philadelphia
PhiladelphiaThe skyline over the Schuylkill

Photos: La Romana by Edgar El, CC BY 3.0, cropped; Philadelphia by Trev W. Adams, Pexels License.

La Romana or Philadelphia?

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 Romana for

  • beaches
  • wellness
  • nature and the outdoors

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

Choose Philadelphia for

  • live music and the arts
  • culture and sights
  • getting around

What lies behind each score is written up on Philadelphia’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 Romana 84, Philadelphia 36: La Romana leads by 48 points.
Food & drink. La Romana 38, Philadelphia 62: Philadelphia leads by 24 points.
Culture & sights. La Romana 24, Philadelphia 72: Philadelphia leads by 48 points.
Nightlife. La Romana 30, Philadelphia 55: Philadelphia leads by 25 points.
Nature & outdoors. La Romana 62, Philadelphia 52: La Romana leads by 10 points.
Day trips. La Romana 52, Philadelphia 80: Philadelphia leads by 28 points.
Good for families. La Romana 56, Philadelphia 68: Philadelphia leads by 12 points.
Getting around. La Romana 24, Philadelphia 66: Philadelphia leads by 42 points.
Shopping & style. La Romana 28, Philadelphia 57: Philadelphia leads by 29 points.
Affordability. La Romana 50, Philadelphia 40: La Romana leads by 10 points.
Live music & performing arts. La Romana 17, Philadelphia 72: Philadelphia leads by 55 points.
Wellness & relaxation. La Romana 44, Philadelphia 26: La Romana leads by 18 points.
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What lies behind each score is written up on the two cities’ own pages: La Romana and Philadelphia.

Your match

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

La Romana
42match

Wins on beaches and wellness with your weighting.

Philadelphia
Best match
57match

Wins on live music and the arts and culture and sights with your weighting.

What matters to you?

When should you go?

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

La Romana in July

32 °Cdaytime high
24 °Cnight-time low
87 mmrain in the month
No recordsunshine a day
28 °Csea
13 hdaylight a day

Philadelphia in July

31 °Cdaytime high
21 °Cnight-time low
111 mmrain in the month
8 hsunshine a day
No seasea
15 hdaylight a day

Daytime high, °C

0°10°20°30°40°JFMAMJJASOND

Rainfall in the month, mm

050100150JFMAMJJASOND
La RomanaPhiladelphia

Where the figures come from

La Romana's temperatures are measured 65 km from the centre, at Punta Cana.

La Romana 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. La Romana: 1993-2020 (rainfall 1991-2020) normals, Punta Cana (65.4 km from centre). Philadelphia: 1991-2020 normals, Philadelphia International Airport (11.3 km from centre).

Before you go

MeasureLa RomanaPhiladelphia
Official languageSpanish-
CurrencyDominican Peso (DOP)US Dollar (USD)
SocketsAB110 V, 60 HzAB120 V, 60 Hz
Driving sideRightRight
Time zoneUTC-4UTC-5, UTC-4 in summer
Emergency number911911
Elevation10 m12 m
Main airportCasa De Campo International Airport (LRM)7 km from centre13 non-stop destinationsPhiladelphia International Airport (PHL)11 km from centre129 non-stop destinations
Public holidays this year13 days12 days

By the numbers

MeasureLa RomanaPhiladelphia
City population139,2381,603,797
People per km²5124,339
Museums within 10 km054
UNESCO World Heritage sites within 50 km01
Swim season, months above 21 °C12 months-

Where else could you go?

Every comparison below shares a destination with this one, so you can follow La Romana or Philadelphia 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). 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. 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.