VacationSelector
A boat in the swell beside El Arco, Los Cabos
Los CabosA boat in the swell beside El Arco
Santo Domingo church behind agaves, Oaxaca
OaxacaSanto Domingo church behind agaves

Photos: Los Cabos by Jules Clark, Pexels License; Oaxaca by Öskr Rck, CC BY-SA 3.0, cropped.

Los Cabos or Oaxaca?

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 Cabos for

  • beaches
  • nightlife
  • nature and the outdoors

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

Choose Oaxaca for

  • culture and sights
  • prices
  • food and drink

What lies behind each score is written up on Oaxaca’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 Cabos 84, Oaxaca 5: Los Cabos leads by 79 points.
Food & drink. Los Cabos 54, Oaxaca 84: Oaxaca leads by 30 points.
Culture & sights. Los Cabos 20, Oaxaca 74: Oaxaca leads by 54 points.
Nightlife. Los Cabos 66, Oaxaca 40: Los Cabos leads by 26 points.
Nature & outdoors. Los Cabos 78, Oaxaca 62: Los Cabos leads by 16 points.
Day trips. Los Cabos 42, Oaxaca 65: Oaxaca leads by 23 points.
Good for families. Los Cabos 55, Oaxaca 40: Los Cabos leads by 15 points.
Getting around. Los Cabos 28, Oaxaca 55: Oaxaca leads by 27 points.
Shopping & style. Los Cabos 36, Oaxaca 62: Oaxaca leads by 26 points.
Affordability. Los Cabos 28, Oaxaca 77: Oaxaca leads by 49 points.
Live music & performing arts. Los Cabos 12, Oaxaca 38: Oaxaca leads by 26 points.
Wellness & relaxation. Los Cabos 58, Oaxaca 50: Los Cabos leads by 8 points.
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What lies behind each score is written up on the two cities’ own pages: Los Cabos and Oaxaca.

Your match

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

Los Cabos
47match

Wins on beaches and nightlife with your weighting.

Oaxaca
Best match
54match

Wins on culture and sights 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 Cabos in July

30 °Cdaytime high
25 °Cnight-time low
19 mmrain in the month
No recordsunshine a day
26 °Csea
13 hdaylight a day

Oaxaca in July

28 °Cdaytime high
15 °Cnight-time low
80 mmrain in the month
7 hsunshine a day
No seasea
13 hdaylight a day

Daytime high, °C

0°10°20°30°40°JFMAMJJASOND

Rainfall in the month, mm

050100150JFMAMJJASOND
Los CabosOaxaca

Where the figures come from

Los Cabos has no weather station within reach, so its figures come from a gridded climate model rather than a measured record, and read a broad area rather than the city itself.

Temperature and rainfall are climate normals, averaged over the years shown. Los Cabos: 2001-2020 normals, NASA POWER reanalysis grid, no weather station within 90 km. Oaxaca: 1961-1990 normals, Oaxaca, Oax. (1.1 km from centre).

Before you go

MeasureLos CabosOaxaca
Official languageSpanish, Nahuatl, Yucatec MayaSpanish, Nahuatl, Yucatec Maya
CurrencyMexican Peso (MXN)Mexican Peso (MXN)
SocketsAB127 V, 60 HzAB127 V, 60 Hz
Driving sideRightRight
Time zoneUTC-7UTC-6
Emergency number911911
Elevation11 m1,555 m
Main airportLos Cabos International Airport (SJD)35 km from centre54 non-stop destinationsXoxocotlán International Airport (OAX)7 km from centre14 non-stop destinations
Public holidays this year9 days9 days

By the numbers

MeasureLos CabosOaxaca
City population202,694258,913
People per km²-3,028
Museums within 10 km110
UNESCO World Heritage sites within 50 km02
Swim season, months above 21 °C12 months-

Where else could you go?

Every comparison below shares a destination with this one, so you can follow Los Cabos or Oaxaca somewhere new.

Browse every destination

Sources

Structured data from Wikidata (CC0). Temperature and rainfall for destinations with no weather station are from the NASA POWER 2001-2020 climatology, derived from MERRA-2. 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. Weather data by Meteostat. Meteorological data provided by NOAA, DWD and others. 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.