VacationSelector
A palm-lined Hollywood street with the Hollywood Sign behind, Los Angeles
Los AngelesA palm-lined Hollywood street with the Hollywood Sign behind
Playa Tamarindo, Tamarindo
TamarindoPlaya Tamarindo

Photos: Los Angeles by BenSherman, Public domain; Tamarindo by Jarle Naustvik, CC BY 2.0, cropped.

Los Angeles or Tamarindo?

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
  • shopping
  • culture and sights

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

Choose Tamarindo for

  • beaches
  • prices
  • getting around

What lies behind each score is written up on Tamarindo’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, Tamarindo 85: Tamarindo leads by 25 points.
Food & drink. Los Angeles 84, Tamarindo 38: Los Angeles leads by 46 points.
Culture & sights. Los Angeles 66, Tamarindo 5: Los Angeles leads by 61 points.
Nightlife. Los Angeles 67, Tamarindo 45: Los Angeles leads by 22 points.
Nature & outdoors. Los Angeles 80, Tamarindo 76: Los Angeles leads by 4 points.
Day trips. Los Angeles 60, Tamarindo 28: Los Angeles leads by 32 points.
Good for families. Los Angeles 84, Tamarindo 55: Los Angeles leads by 29 points.
Getting around. Los Angeles 25, Tamarindo 32: Tamarindo leads by 7 points.
Shopping & style. Los Angeles 80, Tamarindo 18: Los Angeles leads by 62 points.
Affordability. Los Angeles 24, Tamarindo 36: Tamarindo leads by 12 points.
Live music & performing arts. Los Angeles 83, Tamarindo 10: Los Angeles leads by 73 points.
Wellness & relaxation. Los Angeles 60, Tamarindo 45: Los Angeles leads by 15 points.
0255075100

What lies behind each score is written up on the two cities’ own pages: Los Angeles and Tamarindo.

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 shopping with your weighting.

Tamarindo
39match

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

Tamarindo in July

33 °Cdaytime high
23 °Cnight-time low
129 mmrain in the month
29 °Csea
13 hdaylight a day

Daytime high, °C

0°10°20°30°40°JFMAMJJASOND

Rainfall in the month, mm

0100200300400JFMAMJJASOND
Los AngelesTamarindo

Where the figures come from

Tamarindo's temperatures are measured 54 km from the centre, at Liberia.

Tamarindo 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). Tamarindo: 1991-2020 normals, Liberia (53.8 km from centre).

Before you go

MeasureLos AngelesTamarindo
Official language-Spanish
CurrencyUS Dollar (USD)Costa Rican Colon (CRC)
SocketsAB120 V, 60 HzAB120 V, 60 Hz
Driving sideRightRight
Time zoneUTC-8, UTC-7 in summerUTC-6
Emergency number911911
Elevation106 m27 m
Main airportLos Angeles International Airport (LAX)19 km from centre177 non-stop destinationsDaniel Oduber Quirós International Airport (LIR)43 km from centre30 non-stop destinations
Public holidays this year13 days11 days

By the numbers

MeasureLos AngelesTamarindo
City population3,898,7477,132
People per km²2,99457
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 Tamarindo 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 2026-11-02. Daily budgets are estimates from country price levels.