VacationSelector
Rathausquai on the Reuss, Lucerne
LucerneRathausquai on the Reuss
The opera house on Place de la Comédie, Montpellier
MontpellierThe opera house on Place de la Comédie

Photos: Lucerne by ILOVESwitzerland, Pexels License; Montpellier by Peter, CC BY 2.0, cropped.

Lucerne or Montpellier?

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 Lucerne for

  • nature and the outdoors
  • getting around
  • families

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

Choose Montpellier for

  • prices
  • beaches
  • food and drink

What lies behind each score is written up on Montpellier’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. Lucerne 35, Montpellier 64: Montpellier leads by 29 points.
Food & drink. Lucerne 35, Montpellier 64: Montpellier leads by 29 points.
Culture & sights. Lucerne 58, Montpellier 60: Montpellier leads by 2 points.
Nightlife. Lucerne 28, Montpellier 56: Montpellier leads by 28 points.
Nature & outdoors. Lucerne 92, Montpellier 72: Lucerne leads by 20 points.
Day trips. Lucerne 78, Montpellier 85: Montpellier leads by 7 points.
Good for families. Lucerne 66, Montpellier 62: Lucerne leads by 4 points.
Getting around. Lucerne 86, Montpellier 74: Lucerne leads by 12 points.
Shopping & style. Lucerne 46, Montpellier 47: Montpellier leads by 1 points.
Affordability. Lucerne 8, Montpellier 50: Montpellier leads by 42 points.
Live music & performing arts. Lucerne 66, Montpellier 63: Lucerne leads by 3 points.
Wellness & relaxation. Lucerne 46, Montpellier 42: Lucerne leads by 4 points.
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What lies behind each score is written up on the two cities’ own pages: Lucerne and Montpellier.

Your match

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

Lucerne
54match

Wins on nature and the outdoors and getting around with your weighting.

Montpellier
Best match
62match

Wins on prices and beaches with your weighting.

What matters to you?

When should you go?

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

Lucerne in July

24 °Cdaytime high
13 °Cnight-time low
141 mmrain in the month
7 hsunshine a day
No seasea
16 hdaylight a day

Montpellier in July

30 °Cdaytime high
19 °Cnight-time low
17 mmrain in the month
11 hsunshine a day
21 °Csea
15 hdaylight a day

Daytime high, °C

0°10°20°30°JFMAMJJASOND

Rainfall in the month, mm

050100150JFMAMJJASOND
LucerneMontpellier

Where the figures come from

Lucerne 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.

Lucerne's sunshine is measured 42 km from the centre, at Zurich Town / Ville..

Temperature and rainfall are climate normals, averaged over the years shown. Lucerne: 2005-2025 (sunshine 1991-2020, rainfall 1991-2020) normals, Emmen (4.2 km from centre). Montpellier: 1991-2020 normals, Montpellier (7.8 km from centre).

Before you go

MeasureLucerneMontpellier
Official languageFrench, German, Italian, RomanshFrench
CurrencySwiss Franc (CHF)Euro (EUR)
SocketsCJ230 V, 50 HzCE230 V, 50 Hz
Driving sideRightRight
Time zoneUTC+1, UTC+2 in summerUTC+1, UTC+2 in summer
Emergency number112112
Elevation436 m7 m
Main airportZürich Airport (ZRH)49 km from centre226 non-stop destinationsMontpellier-Méditerranée Airport (MPL)8 km from centre41 non-stop destinations
Public holidays this year12 days11 days

By the numbers

MeasureLucerneMontpellier
City population86,234310,240
People per km²2,9635,452
Museums within 10 km1414
UNESCO World Heritage sites within 50 km12
Swim season, months above 21 °C-2 months

Where else could you go?

Every comparison below shares a destination with this one, so you can follow Lucerne or Montpellier 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. Airport data from OurAirports (public domain). Tourism statistics from Eurostat, © European Union, reused under CC BY 4.0. 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. Sea surface temperature from NOAA OISST v2.1, NOAA Physical Sciences Laboratory. 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.