VacationSelector
Main Beach with its palms and lifeguard tower, Laguna Beach
Laguna BeachMain Beach with its palms and lifeguard tower
The beach and the bay with the mountains behind, Nuevo Vallarta
Nuevo VallartaThe beach and the bay with the mountains behind

Photos: Laguna Beach by Mark Stebnicki, Pexels License; Nuevo Vallarta by Harpqueen, Public domain.

Laguna Beach 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 Laguna Beach for

  • shopping
  • live music and the arts
  • culture and sights

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

Choose Nuevo Vallarta for

  • prices
  • beaches
  • 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. Laguna Beach 72, Nuevo Vallarta 84: Nuevo Vallarta leads by 12 points.
Food & drink. Laguna Beach and Nuevo Vallarta are level on 40.
Culture & sights. Laguna Beach 27, Nuevo Vallarta 6: Laguna Beach leads by 21 points.
Nightlife. Laguna Beach 18, Nuevo Vallarta 16: Laguna Beach leads by 2 points.
Nature & outdoors. Laguna Beach 73, Nuevo Vallarta 75: Nuevo Vallarta leads by 2 points.
Day trips. Laguna Beach 72, Nuevo Vallarta 58: Laguna Beach leads by 14 points.
Good for families. Laguna Beach 68, Nuevo Vallarta 73: Nuevo Vallarta leads by 5 points.
Getting around. Laguna Beach 33, Nuevo Vallarta 25: Laguna Beach leads by 8 points.
Shopping & style. Laguna Beach 46, Nuevo Vallarta 22: Laguna Beach leads by 24 points.
Affordability. Laguna Beach 12, Nuevo Vallarta 45: Nuevo Vallarta leads by 33 points.
Live music & performing arts. Laguna Beach 40, Nuevo Vallarta 18: Laguna Beach leads by 22 points.
Wellness & relaxation. Laguna Beach 47, Nuevo Vallarta 55: Nuevo Vallarta leads by 8 points.
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What lies behind each score is written up on the two cities’ own pages: Laguna Beach and Nuevo Vallarta.

Your match

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

Laguna Beach
Best match
46match

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

Nuevo Vallarta
43match

Wins on prices and beaches with your weighting.

What matters to you?

When should you go?

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

Laguna Beach in July

28 °Cdaytime high
17 °Cnight-time low
1 mmrain in the month
20 °Csea
14 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
Laguna BeachNuevo Vallarta

Where the figures come from

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. Laguna Beach: 1981-2010 normals, Irvine (15.5 km from centre). Nuevo Vallarta: 1991-2020 normals, TerraClimate 4 km grid at the town, no weather station within 90 km.

Before you go

MeasureLaguna BeachNuevo Vallarta
Official language-Spanish, Nahuatl, Yucatec Maya
CurrencyUS Dollar (USD)Mexican Peso (MXN)
SocketsAB120 V, 60 HzAB127 V, 60 Hz
Driving sideRightRight
Time zoneUTC-8, UTC-7 in summerUTC-6
Emergency number911911
Elevation6 m3 m
Main airportJohn Wayne Orange County International Airport (SNA)18 km from centre53 non-stop destinationsPuerto Vallarta International Airport (PVR)4 km from centre52 non-stop destinations
Public holidays this year13 days9 days

By the numbers

MeasureLaguna BeachNuevo Vallarta
City population23,0321,301
People per km²907-
Museums within 10 km20
UNESCO World Heritage sites within 50 km01
Swim season, months above 21 °CNone12 months

Where else could you go?

Every comparison below shares a destination with this one, so you can follow Laguna Beach or Nuevo Vallarta 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). 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. Ground elevations sampled from the Mapzen terrain tiles via OpenTopoData, merging SRTM, ASTER, NED, EU-DEM and national sources. Temperature and rainfall for destinations with no weather station are from the NASA POWER 2001-2020 climatology, derived from MERRA-2. 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.