VacationSelector

Lisbon or Santiago de Compostela?

Two destinations compared on nine measures of openly sourced data. Weight what matters to you and the verdict follows.

Your match

Lisbon
✓ Best match
68
match

Wins on beaches & swimming and good for families with your weighting.

Santiago de Compostela
42
match

Has no clear advantage with the weighting you have chosen.

What matters to you?

Pick a travel style or drag the sliders. The match scores above update as you do.

The verdict

Choose Lisbon if you want the sea close to the centre, at 2km, a wide choice of places to eat and a warm, dry summer that lasts several months.

Choose Santiago de Compostela if you prefer a small city of about 101,000 people, museums grouped tightly around the centre and more park space near where you stay, and you can accept rain in most months of the year.

Scoreboard

Each measure scored 0 to 100. Open a row for the figures behind the score.

LisbonSantiago de Compostela
Beaches & swimming. Lisbon leads by 57 points.57
LisbonSantiago de Compostela
Score570
Swim season months00
Beaches 10 km240
Coast distance2 km26 km
Water distance2 km26 km
Places to eat. Lisbon leads by 32 points.32
LisbonSantiago de Compostela
Score8048
Restaurants within 2 km of centre2,496336
Effective number of cuisines within 2 km3123
Museums & heritage. Lisbon leads by 26 points.26
LisbonSantiago de Compostela
Score7044
Museums within 10 km12416
Museums within 2 km of centre5414
Share of museums within 2 km %4488
Unesco sites within 50 km32
Nightlife. Lisbon leads by 29 points.29
LisbonSantiago de Compostela
Score6536
Drinking venues within 4 km1,225306
Drinking venues within 2 km of centre956268
Share of drinking venues within 2 km %7888
Nightclubs within 4 km6513
Nature & day trips. Lisbon leads by 10 points.10
LisbonSantiago de Compostela
Score5646
Protected land share 50 km %1111
Landscape blanket share 50 km %00
Land share of disc %5492
Park area within 2 km77 hectares109 hectares
Good for families. Lisbon leads by 42 points.42
LisbonSantiago de Compostela
Score6927
Tourist attractions within 2 km822
Park area within 2 km77 hectares109 hectares
Theme parks within 30 km10
Sights concentration. Lisbon leads by 24 points.24
LisbonSantiago de Compostela
Score6642
Notable places within 2 km16944
Min wikipedia languages55
Value for money. Lisbon leads by 3 points.3
LisbonSantiago de Compostela
Score7471
Price level global55.960.8
Daily budget€109€122
Year-round weather. Lisbon leads by 16 points.16
LisbonSantiago de Compostela
Score7862
Monthly daytime high14.9 °C to 28.4 °C11.3 °C to 25 °C
Monthly rainfall3 mm to 121 mm41 mm to 223 mm
Dry months40
0255075100

Where they differ

Lisbon has the sea 2km from the centre and 24 beaches within reach, where Santiago de Compostela's nearest coast is 26km away and it has none. It also has many times as many restaurants near the centre and a somewhat wider range of kitchens, many times as many attractions for children, 1 theme park where Santiago has none, and about three times as many notable places within walking distance.

Santiago de Compostela has more park space near the centre and museums grouped tightly together, so less travelling between them.

Where they are alike

On cost, the two sit close: national estimates put the daily budget at €109 in Portugal and €122 in Spain, and these are country-wide price levels for restaurants and hotels rather than measurements of either city.

Both are warmest in August and driest in July, and 11% of the land around each is protected, so countryside is within day-trip reach from either.

Which traveller are you?

A family with children is better served by Lisbon: many more attractions near the centre, 1 theme park where Santiago de Compostela has none, and beaches 2km from the centre rather than a 26km trip to the coast.

Anyone who plans evenings around eating and drinking should also take Lisbon, which has many times as many restaurants, bars and clubs near the centre, and a somewhat wider range of kitchens.

A walker after a quiet, compact base will prefer Santiago de Compostela: museums grouped tightly around the centre, more park space nearby, and 11% of the surrounding land protected for days out.

What the numbers don't tell you

The daily budget figures are national estimates for Portugal and Spain, not measurements of these two cities. A capital and a smaller city can each sit well away from their country's average, by more than the gap between the two national figures, so treat it as background rather than a reason to choose.

Lisbon's beach advantage is real in distance, 2km, but not in water temperature: neither city has a month with the sea at 21°C or more. And Lisbon's warmest, driest months are also the months most people travel, while Santiago de Compostela's only dry window is the same short summer.

When should you go?

The figures behind each month. Each row is shaded against that destination's own year, so the deepest cell is its best month for that measure and the palest its weakest. Shades are not comparable between the two rows.

J
F
M
A
M
J
J
A
S
O
N
D
Daytime high, °C
Lisbon
15
16
19
20
23
26
28
28
26
23
18
15
Santiago de Compostela
11
13
15
17
20
23
25
25
23
19
14
12
Sea temperature, °C
Lisbon
15
15
15
15
16
18
18
19
19
18
17
16
Santiago de Compostela
14
13
13
14
15
16
17
17
17
16
15
14
Rainfall, mm
Lisbon
104
73
72
67
53
13
3
7
36
108
121
102
Santiago de Compostela
217
149
153
136
116
61
41
61
91
208
223
222
Daylight, hours per day
Lisbon
10
11
12
13
14
15
15
14
13
11
10
10
Santiago de Compostela
9
11
12
13
15
15
15
14
13
11
10
9
Sunshine, hours per day
Lisbon
5
6
7
8
10
11
12
11
8
7
5
5
Santiago de Compostela
3
4
5
6
7
7
8
8
6
4
3
3

Temperature and rainfall are thirty-year climate normals, averaged over the years shown. Lisbon: 1991-2020 normals, Lisboa / Geof (1.1 km from centre). Santiago de Compostela: 1991-2020 normals, Santiago / Labacolla (8.4 km from centre).

WorseBetter

Lisbon works from June to September, with highs of 26-28°C, midsummer rainfall under 15mm and the sea at its warmest, 19°C, in September. Autumn turns wet quickly, above 100mm a month.

Santiago de Compostela is best in July and August, when highs reach 25°C and rainfall falls to 41-61mm, the only stretch that comes close to dry. From October to January it takes over 200mm a month, so a winter visit there means persistent rain.

Getting there

Flying fromLisbonSantiago de Compostela
MadridMAD
1 h 15 m
€64-74
LIS · 7 km
1 h 15 m
€86-122
SCQ · 10 km
BarcelonaBCN
1 h 50 m
€74-97
LIS · 7 km
1 h 40 m
€71-184
SCQ · 10 km
LondonLHR, LGW, STN, LTN +2
2 h 30 m
€112-185
LIS · 7 km
2 h 0 m
no fares
SCQ · 10 km
ParisCDG, ORY, BVA
2 h 25 m
€118-145
LIS · 7 km
1 h 55 m
no fares
SCQ · 10 km
SevillaSVQ
1 h 5 m
no fares
LIS · 7 km
1 h 25 m
no fares
SCQ · 10 km
TenerifeTFS, TFN
2 h 15 m
no fares
LIS · 7 km
2 h 50 m
no fares
SCQ · 10 km
PalmaPMI
1 h 50 m
no fares
LIS · 7 km
1 h 50 m
no fares
SCQ · 10 km
MalagaAGP
1 h 15 m
no fares
LIS · 7 km
1 h 35 m
no fares
SCQ · 10 km
AlicanteALC
1 h 35 m
no fares
LIS · 7 km
1 h 40 m
€218-283
1 stop
SCQ · 10 km
MarrakechRAK
1 h 35 m
€95-118
LIS · 7 km
2 h 10 m
no fares
SCQ · 10 km

The busiest departure cities for these two, with a place kept for each other part of the world. Busiest means arriving passengers where an official count exists, and where none does, the number of non-stop services flown: official route statistics are published by the European reporting countries and by nobody else, so a table ranked on them alone would offer a reader in New York or Tokyo ten European cities. Flying times are estimated from the distance between airports, and every row is a city flown non-stop to both. Where the typical offer connects anyway, the stops are shown. Under each figure is the airport the flight lands at and how far that is from the centre, because the nearest airport is not always the one a route is flown to. Where both columns name the same airport it is one flight, and the difference between the two is the distance printed beside it. Typical return fares for 2026-08 to 2026-10, cached market data up to 7 days old. The figure is the middle half of the offers found, so a single price means they agreed and a range means they did not; for a typical route that middle half spans about a quarter of the median, and for the least settled routes rather more than the median itself.

Before you go

MeasureLisbonSantiago de Compostela
Official languagePortugueseSpanish
CurrencyEuro (EUR)Euro (EUR)
SocketsCF230 V, 50 HzCF230 V, 50 Hz
Driving sideRightRight
Time zoneUTC, UTC+1 in summerUTC+1, UTC+2 in summer
Emergency number112112
Elevation100 m260 m
Main airportLisbon Humberto Delgado Airport (LIS)7 km from centre153 non-stop destinationsSantiago-Rosalía de Castro Airport (SCQ)10 km from centre27 non-stop destinations
Public holidays this year14 days13 days

By the numbers

MeasureLisbonSantiago de Compostela
City population545,796100,965
People per km²5,453459
Museums within 10 km786
UNESCO World Heritage sites within 50 km32
Distinct cuisines in the centre10638
Swim season, months above 21 °CNoneNone

Where else could you go?

Every comparison below shares a destination with this one, so you can follow Lisbon or Santiago de Compostela somewhere new.

Browse every destination we have measured

Sources

© OpenStreetMap contributors, data available under the Open Database Licence. Place counts include data from Overture Maps Foundation (CDLA Permissive 2.0), assembled from Meta, Microsoft, Foursquare and other providers. Notable-place counts from Wikidata (CC0), weighted by Wikipedia language editions. Structured data from Wikidata (CC0). Weather data by Meteostat. Meteorological data provided by NOAA, DWD and others. 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. Daylight hours computed from each destination's latitude using the NOAA solar position algorithm. Typical fares from Travelpayouts (Aviasales data). Route-level air passenger statistics from Eurostat, © European Union, reused under CC BY 4.0. Exchange rates via Frankfurter, based on European Central Bank reference rates.

Scores follow rubric v2; snapshot generated 2026-08-31. Typical prices can be up to 7 days old. Daily budgets are estimates from country price levels.