VacationSelector
The Ferris wheel on Santa Monica Pier, Los Angeles
Los AngelesThe Ferris wheel on Santa Monica Pier
Palms on a white beach at Cap Cana, Punta Cana
Punta CanaPalms on a white beach at Cap Cana

Photos: Los Angeles by Domenico Convertini, CC BY-SA 2.0, cropped; Punta Cana by Mary Mark Ockerbloom, CC0.

Los Angeles 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 Los Angeles for

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

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

Choose Punta Cana for

  • beaches
  • prices

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. Los Angeles 60, Punta Cana 94: Punta Cana leads by 34 points.
Food & drink. Los Angeles 84, Punta Cana 30: Los Angeles leads by 54 points.
Culture & sights. Los Angeles 66, Punta Cana 8: Los Angeles leads by 58 points.
Nightlife. Los Angeles 67, Punta Cana 40: Los Angeles leads by 27 points.
Nature & outdoors. Los Angeles 80, Punta Cana 52: Los Angeles leads by 28 points.
Day trips. Los Angeles 60, Punta Cana 35: Los Angeles leads by 25 points.
Good for families. Los Angeles 84, Punta Cana 68: Los Angeles leads by 16 points.
Getting around. Los Angeles 25, Punta Cana 15: Los Angeles leads by 10 points.
Shopping & style. Los Angeles 80, Punta Cana 30: Los Angeles leads by 50 points.
Affordability. Los Angeles 24, Punta Cana 44: Punta Cana leads by 20 points.
Live music & performing arts. Los Angeles 83, Punta Cana 15: Los Angeles leads by 68 points.
Wellness & relaxation. Los Angeles 60, Punta Cana 52: Los Angeles leads by 8 points.
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What lies behind each score is written up on the two cities’ own pages: Los Angeles and Punta Cana.

Your match

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

Los Angeles
Best match
64match

Wins on live music and the arts and culture and sights with your weighting.

Punta Cana
40match

Wins on beaches and prices with your weighting.

What matters to you?

When should you go?

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

Los Angeles in July

24 °Cdaytime high
18 °Cnight-time low
1 mmrain in the month
20 °Csea
14 hdaylight a day

Punta Cana in July

32 °Cdaytime high
24 °Cnight-time low
96 mmrain in the month
28 °Csea
13 hdaylight a day

Daytime high, °C

0°10°20°30°40°JFMAMJJASOND

Rainfall in the month, mm

050100150JFMAMJJASOND
Los AngelesPunta 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. Los Angeles: 1991-2020 normals, Los Angeles Airport (18.5 km from centre). Punta Cana: 1993-2020 (rainfall 1991-2020) normals, Punta Cana (0.9 km from centre).

Before you go

MeasureLos AngelesPunta Cana
Official language-Spanish
CurrencyUS Dollar (USD)Dominican Peso (DOP)
SocketsAB120 V, 60 HzAB110 V, 60 Hz
Driving sideRightRight
Time zoneUTC-8, UTC-7 in summerUTC-4
Emergency number911911
Elevation106 m28 m
Main airportLos Angeles International Airport (LAX)19 km from centre177 non-stop destinationsPunta Cana International Airport (PUJ)1 km from centre93 non-stop destinations
Public holidays this year13 days13 days

By the numbers

MeasureLos AngelesPunta Cana
City population3,898,747138,919
People per km²2,994292
Museums within 10 km390
UNESCO World Heritage sites within 50 km10
Swim season, months above 21 °CNone12 months

Where else could you go?

Every comparison below shares a destination with this one, so you can follow Los Angeles 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). Exchange rates via Frankfurter, based on European Central Bank reference rates. 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.

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.