VacationSelector
Main Beach with its palms and lifeguard tower, Laguna Beach
Laguna BeachMain Beach with its palms and lifeguard tower
Playa de los Muertos below the green hills, Puerto Vallarta
Puerto VallartaPlaya de los Muertos below the green hills

Photos: Laguna Beach by Mark Stebnicki, Pexels License; Puerto Vallarta by RL0919, CC BY-SA 4.0, cropped.

Laguna Beach or Puerto 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

  • day trips
  • live music and the arts
  • shopping

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

Choose Puerto Vallarta for

  • nightlife
  • prices
  • food and drink

What lies behind each score is written up on Puerto 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, Puerto Vallarta 85: Puerto Vallarta leads by 13 points.
Food & drink. Laguna Beach 40, Puerto Vallarta 62: Puerto Vallarta leads by 22 points.
Culture & sights. Laguna Beach 27, Puerto Vallarta 28: Puerto Vallarta leads by 1 points.
Nightlife. Laguna Beach 18, Puerto Vallarta 66: Puerto Vallarta leads by 48 points.
Nature & outdoors. Laguna Beach 73, Puerto Vallarta 76: Puerto Vallarta leads by 3 points.
Day trips. Laguna Beach 72, Puerto Vallarta 55: Laguna Beach leads by 17 points.
Good for families. Laguna Beach 68, Puerto Vallarta 65: Laguna Beach leads by 3 points.
Getting around. Laguna Beach 33, Puerto Vallarta 45: Puerto Vallarta leads by 12 points.
Shopping & style. Laguna Beach 46, Puerto Vallarta 42: Laguna Beach leads by 4 points.
Affordability. Laguna Beach 12, Puerto Vallarta 60: Puerto Vallarta leads by 48 points.
Live music & performing arts. Laguna Beach 40, Puerto Vallarta 32: Laguna Beach leads by 8 points.
Wellness & relaxation. Laguna Beach 47, Puerto Vallarta 52: Puerto Vallarta leads by 5 points.
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What lies behind each score is written up on the two cities’ own pages: Laguna Beach and Puerto Vallarta.

Your match

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

Laguna Beach
46match

Wins on day trips and live music and the arts with your weighting.

Puerto Vallarta
Best match
56match

Wins on nightlife and prices 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

Puerto Vallarta in July

34 °Cdaytime high
24 °Cnight-time low
209 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 BeachPuerto Vallarta

Where the figures come from

Puerto 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). Puerto Vallarta: 1991-2020 normals, TerraClimate 4 km grid at the town, no weather station within 90 km.

Before you go

MeasureLaguna BeachPuerto 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 m101 m
Main airportJohn Wayne Orange County International Airport (SNA)18 km from centre53 non-stop destinationsPuerto Vallarta International Airport (PVR)5 km from centre52 non-stop destinations
Public holidays this year13 days9 days

By the numbers

MeasureLaguna BeachPuerto Vallarta
City population23,032224,166
People per km²9074,311
Museums within 10 km22
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 Puerto 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. 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.