VacationSelector
A boat in the swell beside El Arco, Los Cabos
Los CabosA boat in the swell beside El Arco
The old Tampa Bay Hotel across the river, Tampa
TampaThe old Tampa Bay Hotel across the river

Photos: Los Cabos by Jules Clark, Pexels License; Tampa by Ken Lund, CC BY-SA 2.0, cropped.

Los Cabos or Tampa?

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

  • wellness
  • nature and the outdoors
  • beaches

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

Choose Tampa for

  • live music and the arts
  • families
  • culture and sights

What lies behind each score is written up on Tampa’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, Tampa 70: Los Cabos leads by 14 points.
Food & drink. Los Cabos 54, Tampa 57: Tampa leads by 3 points.
Culture & sights. Los Cabos 20, Tampa 42: Tampa leads by 22 points.
Nightlife. Los Cabos 66, Tampa 52: Los Cabos leads by 14 points.
Nature & outdoors. Los Cabos 78, Tampa 55: Los Cabos leads by 23 points.
Day trips. Los Cabos 42, Tampa 54: Tampa leads by 12 points.
Good for families. Los Cabos 55, Tampa 78: Tampa leads by 23 points.
Getting around. Los Cabos 28, Tampa 22: Los Cabos leads by 6 points.
Shopping & style. Los Cabos 36, Tampa 40: Tampa leads by 4 points.
Affordability. Los Cabos 28, Tampa 40: Tampa leads by 12 points.
Live music & performing arts. Los Cabos 12, Tampa 47: Tampa leads by 35 points.
Wellness & relaxation. Los Cabos 58, Tampa 30: Los Cabos leads by 28 points.
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What lies behind each score is written up on the two cities’ own pages: Los Cabos and Tampa.

Your match

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

Too close to call, 2 points apart

Los Cabos
47match

Wins on wellness and nature and the outdoors with your weighting.

Tampa
49match

Wins on live music and the arts and families 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

Tampa in July

32 °Cdaytime high
25 °Cnight-time low
197 mmrain in the month
9 hsunshine a day
30 °Csea
14 hdaylight a day

Daytime high, °C

0°10°20°30°40°JFMAMJJASOND

Rainfall in the month, mm

050100150200250JFMAMJJASOND
Los CabosTampa

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. Tampa: 1991-2020 normals, Tampa International Airport (7.6 km from centre).

Before you go

MeasureLos CabosTampa
Official languageSpanish, Nahuatl, Yucatec Maya-
CurrencyMexican Peso (MXN)US Dollar (USD)
SocketsAB127 V, 60 HzAB120 V, 60 Hz
Driving sideRightRight
Time zoneUTC-7UTC-5, UTC-4 in summer
Emergency number911911
Elevation11 m30 m
Main airportLos Cabos International Airport (SJD)35 km from centre54 non-stop destinationsTampa International Airport (TPA)8 km from centre101 non-stop destinations
Public holidays this year9 days11 days

By the numbers

MeasureLos CabosTampa
City population202,694384,959
People per km²-848
Museums within 10 km16
UNESCO World Heritage sites within 50 km00
Swim season, months above 21 °C12 months8 months

Where else could you go?

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