VacationSelector
The fountain on Plaza Mayor, Lima
LimaThe fountain on Plaza Mayor
Palms on a white beach at Cap Cana, Punta Cana
Punta CanaPalms on a white beach at Cap Cana

Photos: Lima by James C., CC BY-SA 2.0, cropped; Punta Cana by Mary Mark Ockerbloom, CC0.

Lima or Punta Cana?

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

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

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

Choose Punta Cana for

  • beaches
  • wellness
  • families

What lies behind each score is written up on Punta Cana’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, Punta Cana 94: Punta Cana leads by 52 points.
Food & drink. Lima 88, Punta Cana 30: Lima leads by 58 points.
Culture & sights. Lima 66, Punta Cana 8: Lima leads by 58 points.
Nightlife. Lima 62, Punta Cana 40: Lima leads by 22 points.
Nature & outdoors. Lima 45, Punta Cana 52: Punta Cana leads by 7 points.
Day trips. Lima 34, Punta Cana 35: Punta Cana leads by 1 points.
Good for families. Lima 42, Punta Cana 68: Punta Cana leads by 26 points.
Getting around. Lima 35, Punta Cana 15: Lima leads by 20 points.
Shopping & style. Lima 52, Punta Cana 30: Lima leads by 22 points.
Affordability. Lima 70, Punta Cana 44: Lima leads by 26 points.
Live music & performing arts. Lima 53, Punta Cana 15: Lima leads by 38 points.
Wellness & relaxation. Lima 25, Punta Cana 52: Punta Cana leads by 27 points.
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What lies behind each score is written up on the two cities’ own pages: Lima and Punta Cana.

Your match

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

Lima
Best match
51match

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

Punta Cana
40match

Wins on beaches and wellness 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

Punta Cana in July

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

Daytime high, °C

0°10°20°30°40°JFMAMJJASOND

Rainfall in the month, mm

050100150JFMAMJJASOND
LimaPunta Cana

Where the figures come from

Punta Cana 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. Lima: 1991-2020 normals, Lima-Callao / Aerop. Internacional Jorgechavez (10.9 km from centre). Punta Cana: 1993-2020 (rainfall 1991-2020) normals, Punta Cana (0.9 km from centre).

Before you go

MeasureLimaPunta Cana
Official languageSpanish, Aymara, QuechuaSpanish
CurrencySol (PEN)Dominican Peso (DOP)
SocketsABC220 V, 60 HzAB110 V, 60 Hz
Driving sideRightRight
Time zoneUTC-5UTC-4
Emergency number111 or 911911
Elevation154 m28 m
Main airportJorge Chávez International Airport (LIM)9 km from centre61 non-stop destinationsPunta Cana International Airport (PUJ)1 km from centre93 non-stop destinations
Public holidays this year16 days13 days

By the numbers

MeasureLimaPunta Cana
City population9,943,800138,919
People per km²3,721292
Museums within 10 km470
UNESCO World Heritage sites within 50 km20
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 Punta Cana 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. Daylight hours computed from each destination's latitude using the NOAA solar position algorithm. Exchange rates via Frankfurter, based on European Central Bank reference rates.

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.