Ljubljana or Rome?
Two destinations compared on nine measures of openly sourced data. Weight what matters to you and the verdict follows.
Your match
Wins on value for money with your weighting.
Wins on good for families and sights concentration with your weighting.
What matters to you?
Pick a travel style or drag the sliders. The match scores above update as you do.
The verdict
Choose Ljubljana if you want a small capital you can cross on foot, with its museums, bars and 10 nearby beaches close at hand, and you do not need sea swimming or child-focused attractions.
Choose Rome if you want depth: far more monuments and museums packed into the centre, theme parks and parkland for children, day trips into protected countryside, and summer sea at 25°C.
Scoreboard
Each measure scored 0 to 100. Open a row for the figures behind the score.
Beaches & swimming. Rome leads by 33 points.33
| Ljubljana | Rome | |
|---|---|---|
| Score | 0 | 33 |
| Swim season months | 0 | 5 |
| Beaches 10 km | 10 | 3 |
| Coast distance | 72 km | 24 km |
| Water distance | — | 24 km |
Places to eat. Rome leads by 5 points.5
| Ljubljana | Rome | |
|---|---|---|
| Score | 55 | 60 |
| Restaurants within 2 km of centre | 292 | 2,241 |
| Effective number of cuisines within 2 km | 40 | 10 |
Museums & heritage. Rome leads by 29 points.29
| Ljubljana | Rome | |
|---|---|---|
| Score | 55 | 84 |
| Museums within 10 km | 26 | 161 |
| Museums within 2 km of centre | 23 | 79 |
| Share of museums within 2 km % | 88 | 49 |
| Unesco sites within 50 km | 3 | 7 |
Nightlife. Rome leads by 29 points.29
| Ljubljana | Rome | |
|---|---|---|
| Score | 45 | 74 |
| Drinking venues within 4 km | 458 | 2,022 |
| Drinking venues within 2 km of centre | 284 | 912 |
| Share of drinking venues within 2 km % | 62 | 45 |
| Nightclubs within 4 km | 24 | 85 |
Nature & day trips. Rome leads by 30 points.30
| Ljubljana | Rome | |
|---|---|---|
| Score | 40 | 70 |
| Protected land share 50 km % | 13 | 19 |
| Landscape blanket share 50 km % | 5 | 0 |
| Land share of disc % | 100 | 78 |
| Park area within 2 km | 75 hectares | 172 hectares |
Good for families. Rome leads by 48 points.48
| Ljubljana | Rome | |
|---|---|---|
| Score | 38 | 86 |
| Tourist attractions within 2 km | 12 | 126 |
| Park area within 2 km | 75 hectares | 172 hectares |
| Theme parks within 30 km | 0 | 4 |
Sights concentration. Rome leads by 41 points.41
| Ljubljana | Rome | |
|---|---|---|
| Score | 58 | 99 |
| Notable places within 2 km | 109 | 1,125 |
| Min wikipedia languages | 5 | 5 |
Value for money. Ljubljana leads by 4 points.4
| Ljubljana | Rome | |
|---|---|---|
| Score | 72 | 68 |
| Price level global | 59.6 | 64.9 |
| Daily budget | €131 | €155 |
Year-round weather. Rome leads by 15 points.15
| Ljubljana | Rome | |
|---|---|---|
| Score | 56 | 71 |
| Monthly daytime high | 4.1 °C to 27.9 °C | 12 °C to 31.4 °C |
| Monthly rainfall | 67 mm to 159 mm | 21 mm to 114 mm |
| Dry months | 0 | 3 |
Where they differ
Ljubljana keeps things close: its museums cluster round the centre, and most of its nightclubs are walkable, where in Rome about half are. It has 10 beaches nearby against Rome's 3, and a wider range of kitchens.
Rome has many times as many notable places within walking distance and many times as many museums, plus 7 UNESCO-listed sites within day-trip reach against Ljubljana's 3. It adds 4 theme parks, twice the central park space and more protected land.
Where they are alike
Value is where the two sit closest. The national estimates behind it, €131 for Slovenia and €155 for Italy, are country price levels rather than measurements of either city.
Eating out and the weather are next. Both give plenty of choice at the table, Rome by sheer number of restaurants, Ljubljana by range of kitchens. Both cool off properly in winter and warm to 28°C or more at the height of summer.
Which traveller are you?
Travelling with children: Rome, clearly. It has many times as many attractions near the centre, twice the park space, 4 theme parks within reach and warm sea in late summer, none of which Ljubljana can match.
Museum-led trips: Rome again for depth, with many times as many museums and 7 UNESCO-listed places within day-trip reach. Ljubljana suits you if you would rather see fewer things without transport between them.
A short break built around evenings out: Ljubljana concentrates its bars and clubs around the centre, so little needs planning. Rome has far more of both, though about half its clubs sit away from the middle.
What the numbers don't tell you
The daily budget is a national estimate, €131 for Slovenia and €155 for Italy, covering restaurant and hotel price levels across each country rather than either city. A capital can sit further from its own national average than these two figures sit from each other, so the gap tells you nothing about which trip costs more.
Ljubljana's 10 nearby beaches come with no recorded sea temperature, so they are a different proposition from Rome's months of warm sea. And Rome's driest, warmest months are also its busiest, while Ljubljana's warmest months are among its wettest.
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.
Temperature and rainfall are thirty-year climate normals, averaged over the years shown. Ljubljana: 1991-2020 normals, Ljubljana / Bezigrad (1.9 km from centre). Rome: 1991-2020 normals, Roma / Ciampino (15.1 km from centre).
Ljubljana is at its best from June to August, with highs of 26-28°C, but rain is heavy right through summer at 121-126mm a month, and heavier still in autumn, peaking at 159mm.
Rome's good weather runs longer and drier. June brings 28°C with only 33mm, and midsummer holds 31°C on 21-38mm, with the sea at 25°C. Autumn stays usable, though November turns wet at 114mm.
Getting there
| Flying from | Ljubljana | Rome |
|---|---|---|
| ParisCDG, ORY, BVA | 1 h 45 m €139-178 1 stop LJU · 20 km | 2 h 0 m €91-122 FCO · 23 km |
| LondonLHR, LGW, STN, LTN +2 | 2 h 5 m no fares LJU · 20 km | 2 h 20 m €76-143 1 stop FCO · 23 km |
| IstanbulIST, SAW | 2 h 10 m €188-190 LJU · 20 km | 2 h 15 m €136-291 FCO · 23 km |
| CataniaCTA | 1 h 45 m no fares TRS · 84 km | 1 h 20 m €60-112 FCO · 23 km |
| DubrovnikDBV | 1 h 10 m no fares ZAG · 126 km | 1 h 15 m no fares FCO · 23 km |
| PalermoPMO | 1 h 40 m no fares TRS · 84 km | 1 h 10 m €38-50 FCO · 23 km |
| BarcelonaBCN | 1 h 55 m no fares TRS · 84 km | 1 h 40 m €44-74 FCO · 23 km |
| DubaiDXB, DWC | 5 h 45 m €374-528 2 stops LJU · 20 km | 5 h 45 m €270-340 FCO · 23 km |
| TorontoYYZ, YHM, YTZ | 9 h 0 m no fares ZAG · 126 km | 9 h 0 m €487-550 1 stop FCO · 23 km |
| SeoulICN, GMP | 10 h 35 m no fares ZAG · 126 km | 11 h 15 m €630-760 FCO · 23 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 2026-09 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
| Measure | Ljubljana | Rome |
|---|---|---|
| Official language | Slovene | Italian |
| Currency | Euro (EUR) | Euro (EUR) |
| Sockets | CF230 V, 50 Hz | CFL230 V, 50 Hz |
| Driving side | Right | Right |
| Time zone | UTC+1, UTC+2 in summer | UTC+1, UTC+2 in summer |
| Emergency number | 112 | 112 |
| Elevation | 309 m | 21 m |
| Main airport | Ljubljana Jože Pučnik Airport (LJU)20 km from centre28 non-stop destinations | Rome–Fiumicino Leonardo da Vinci International Airport (FCO)23 km from centre230 non-stop destinations |
| Public holidays this year | 21 days | 13 days |
By the numbers
| Measure | Ljubljana | Rome |
|---|---|---|
| City population | 284,293 | 2,748,109 |
| People per km² | 1,736 | 2,135 |
| Museums within 10 km | 14 | 177 |
| UNESCO World Heritage sites within 50 km | 3 | 7 |
| Distinct cuisines in the centre | 63 | 65 |
| Swim season, months above 21 °C | – | 5 months |
Where else could you go?
Every comparison below shares a destination with this one, so you can follow Ljubljana or Rome somewhere new.