VacationSelector
The fountain on Plaza Mayor, Lima
LimaThe fountain on Plaza Mayor
Playa de los Muertos below the green hills, Puerto Vallarta
Puerto VallartaPlaya de los Muertos below the green hills

Photos: Lima by James C., CC BY-SA 2.0, cropped; Puerto Vallarta by RL0919, CC BY-SA 4.0, cropped.

Lima 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 Lima for

  • culture and sights
  • food and drink
  • live music and the arts

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

Choose Puerto Vallarta for

  • beaches
  • nature and the outdoors
  • wellness

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. Lima 42, Puerto Vallarta 85: Puerto Vallarta leads by 43 points.
Food & drink. Lima 88, Puerto Vallarta 62: Lima leads by 26 points.
Culture & sights. Lima 66, Puerto Vallarta 28: Lima leads by 38 points.
Nightlife. Lima 62, Puerto Vallarta 66: Puerto Vallarta leads by 4 points.
Nature & outdoors. Lima 45, Puerto Vallarta 76: Puerto Vallarta leads by 31 points.
Day trips. Lima 34, Puerto Vallarta 55: Puerto Vallarta leads by 21 points.
Good for families. Lima 42, Puerto Vallarta 65: Puerto Vallarta leads by 23 points.
Getting around. Lima 35, Puerto Vallarta 45: Puerto Vallarta leads by 10 points.
Shopping & style. Lima 52, Puerto Vallarta 42: Lima leads by 10 points.
Affordability. Lima 70, Puerto Vallarta 60: Lima leads by 10 points.
Live music & performing arts. Lima 53, Puerto Vallarta 32: Lima leads by 21 points.
Wellness & relaxation. Lima 25, Puerto Vallarta 52: Puerto Vallarta leads by 27 points.
0255075100

What lies behind each score is written up on the two cities’ own pages: Lima and Puerto Vallarta.

Your match

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

Lima
51match

Wins on culture and sights and food and drink with your weighting.

Puerto Vallarta
Best match
56match

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

What matters to you?

When should you go?

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

Lima in July

19 °Cdaytime high
16 °Cnight-time low
1 mmrain in the month
1 hsunshine a day
18 °Csea
12 hdaylight a day

Puerto Vallarta in July

34 °Cdaytime high
24 °Cnight-time low
209 mmrain in the month
No recordsunshine a day
30 °Csea
13 hdaylight a day

Daytime high, °C

0°10°20°30°40°JFMAMJJASOND

Rainfall in the month, mm

0100200300JFMAMJJASOND
LimaPuerto 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. Lima: 1991-2020 normals, Lima-Callao / Aerop. Internacional Jorgechavez (10.9 km from centre). Puerto Vallarta: 1991-2020 normals, TerraClimate 4 km grid at the town, no weather station within 90 km.

Before you go

MeasureLimaPuerto Vallarta
Official languageSpanish, Aymara, QuechuaSpanish, Nahuatl, Yucatec Maya
CurrencySol (PEN)Mexican Peso (MXN)
SocketsABC220 V, 60 HzAB127 V, 60 Hz
Driving sideRightRight
Time zoneUTC-5UTC-6
Emergency number111 or 911911
Elevation154 m101 m
Main airportJorge Chávez International Airport (LIM)9 km from centre61 non-stop destinationsPuerto Vallarta International Airport (PVR)5 km from centre52 non-stop destinations
Public holidays this year16 days9 days

By the numbers

MeasureLimaPuerto Vallarta
City population9,943,800224,166
People per km²3,7214,311
Museums within 10 km472
UNESCO World Heritage sites within 50 km21
Swim season, months above 21 °C2 months12 months

Where else could you go?

Every comparison below shares a destination with this one, so you can follow Lima 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). 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. 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 2026-10-31. Daily budgets are estimates from country price levels.