VacationSelector
A yellow tram in a narrow street, Lisbon
LisbonA yellow tram in a narrow street
Brooklyn Bridge and Lower Manhattan, New York
New YorkBrooklyn Bridge and Lower Manhattan

Photos: Lisbon by Riccardo Toso, Pexels License; New York by Jakub Hałun, CC BY 4.0, cropped.

Lisbon or New York?

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 Lisbon for

  • prices
  • nature and the outdoors
  • day trips

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

Choose New York for

  • live music and the arts
  • shopping
  • nightlife

What lies behind each score is written up on New York’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. Lisbon and New York are level on 50.
Food & drink. Lisbon 75, New York 92: New York leads by 17 points.
Culture & sights. Lisbon 78, New York 89: New York leads by 11 points.
Nightlife. Lisbon 75, New York 97: New York leads by 22 points.
Nature & outdoors. Lisbon 75, New York 55: Lisbon leads by 20 points.
Day trips. Lisbon 82, New York 68: Lisbon leads by 14 points.
Good for families. Lisbon 62, New York 70: New York leads by 8 points.
Getting around. Lisbon 66, New York 82: New York leads by 16 points.
Shopping & style. Lisbon 60, New York 97: New York leads by 37 points.
Affordability. Lisbon 55, New York 12: Lisbon leads by 43 points.
Live music & performing arts. Lisbon 60, New York 99: New York leads by 39 points.
Wellness & relaxation. Lisbon 36, New York 42: New York leads by 6 points.
0255075100

What lies behind each score is written up on the two cities’ own pages: Lisbon and New York.

Your match

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

Lisbon
65match

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

New York
Best match
71match

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

What matters to you?

When should you go?

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

Lisbon in July

28 °Cdaytime high
18 °Cnight-time low
3 mmrain in the month
12 hsunshine a day
18 °Csea
15 hdaylight a day

New York in July

30 °Cdaytime high
22 °Cnight-time low
107 mmrain in the month
No recordsunshine a day
22 °Csea
15 hdaylight a day

Daytime high, °C

0°10°20°30°40°JFMAMJJASOND

Rainfall in the month, mm

0255075100125JFMAMJJASOND
LisbonNew York

Temperature and rainfall are climate normals, averaged over the years shown. Lisbon: 1991-2020 normals, Lisboa / Geof (1.1 km from centre). New York: 1991-2020 normals, LaGuardia Airport (12.9 km from centre).

Before you go

MeasureLisbonNew York
Official languagePortuguese-
CurrencyEuro (EUR)US Dollar (USD)
SocketsCF230 V, 50 HzAB120 V, 60 Hz
Driving sideRightRight
Time zoneUTC, UTC+1 in summerUTC-5, UTC-4 in summer
Emergency number112911
Elevation100 m25 m
Main airportLisbon Humberto Delgado Airport (LIS)7 km from centre156 non-stop destinationsJohn F. Kennedy International Airport (JFK)21 km from centre189 non-stop destinations
Public holidays this year14 days13 days

By the numbers

MeasureLisbonNew York
City population545,7968,804,190
People per km²5,4537,256
Museums within 10 km80157
UNESCO World Heritage sites within 50 km32
Swim season, months above 21 °CNone3 months

Where else could you go?

Every comparison below shares a destination with this one, so you can follow Lisbon or New York 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). Tourism statistics from Eurostat, © European Union, reused under CC BY 4.0. 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. 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.