VacationSelector
A canoe on the turquoise lake below the mountains, Lake Louise
Lake LouiseA canoe on the turquoise lake below the mountains
The red cable car above Wellington, Wellington
WellingtonThe red cable car above Wellington

Photos: Lake Louise by Andrew Patrick Photo, Pexels License; Wellington by lumoplank, CC0.

Lake Louise or Wellington?

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 Lake Louise for

  • nature and the outdoors
  • wellness

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

Choose Wellington for

  • live music and the arts
  • food and drink
  • nightlife

What lies behind each score is written up on Wellington’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. Lake Louise 5, Wellington 33: Wellington leads by 28 points.
Food & drink. Lake Louise 20, Wellington 62: Wellington leads by 42 points.
Culture & sights. Lake Louise 7, Wellington 44: Wellington leads by 37 points.
Nightlife. Lake Louise 4, Wellington 45: Wellington leads by 41 points.
Nature & outdoors. Lake Louise 97, Wellington 78: Lake Louise leads by 19 points.
Day trips. Lake Louise 33, Wellington 40: Wellington leads by 7 points.
Good for families. Lake Louise 40, Wellington 62: Wellington leads by 22 points.
Getting around. Lake Louise 28, Wellington 68: Wellington leads by 40 points.
Shopping & style. Lake Louise 6, Wellington 42: Wellington leads by 36 points.
Affordability. Lake Louise 9, Wellington 33: Wellington leads by 24 points.
Live music & performing arts. Lake Louise 3, Wellington 56: Wellington leads by 53 points.
Wellness & relaxation. Lake Louise 42, Wellington 30: Lake Louise leads by 12 points.
0255075100

What lies behind each score is written up on the two cities’ own pages: Lake Louise and Wellington.

Your match

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

Lake Louise
25match

Wins on nature and the outdoors and wellness with your weighting.

Wellington
Best match
49match

Wins on live music and the arts and food and drink with your weighting.

What matters to you?

When should you go?

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

Lake Louise in July

20 °Cdaytime high
6 °Cnight-time low
63 mmrain in the month
No recordsunshine a day
No seasea
16 hdaylight a day

Wellington in July

12 °Cdaytime high
7 °Cnight-time low
111 mmrain in the month
4 hsunshine a day
12 °Csea
10 hdaylight a day

Daytime high, °C

-10°0°10°20°30°JFMAMJJASOND

Rainfall in the month, mm

0255075100125JFMAMJJASOND
Lake LouiseWellington

Where the figures come from

Lake Louise 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.

Wellington's sunshine is measured 47 km from the centre, at Paraparaumu Aerodrome.

Temperature and rainfall are climate normals, averaged over the years shown. Lake Louise: 1991-2020 normals, Yoho Park (11.2 km from centre). Wellington: 1961-1990 (sunshine 1991-2020) normals, Wellington Aerodrome Aws (5.3 km from centre).

Before you go

MeasureLake LouiseWellington
Official languageFrench, EnglishEnglish, New Zealand Sign Language, Māori
CurrencyCanadian Dollar (CAD)New Zealand Dollar (NZD)
SocketsAB120 V, 60 HzI230 V, 50 Hz
Driving sideRightLeft
Time zoneUTC-7, UTC-6 in summerUTC+12, UTC+13 in summer
Emergency number911111
Elevation1,600 m0 m
Main airportCalgary International Airport (YYC)155 km from centre102 non-stop destinationsWellington International Airport (WLG)5 km from centre20 non-stop destinations
Public holidays this year13 days12 days

By the numbers

MeasureLake LouiseWellington
City population-216,200
People per km²-487
Museums within 10 km012
UNESCO World Heritage sites within 50 km20
Swim season, months above 21 °C-None

Where else could you go?

Every comparison below shares a destination with this one, so you can follow Lake Louise or Wellington 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. 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. Sea surface temperature from NOAA OISST v2.1, NOAA Physical Sciences Laboratory. 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.