VacationSelector
The colonnaded court of Luxor Temple, Luxor
LuxorThe colonnaded court of Luxor Temple
The cathedral of Santa Marta, Santa Marta
Santa MartaThe cathedral of Santa Marta

Photos: Luxor by Dennis G. Jarvis, CC BY-SA 2.0, cropped; Santa Marta by Oliver H, CC BY-SA 3.0, cropped.

Luxor or Santa Marta?

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 Luxor for

  • culture and sights
  • day trips
  • prices

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

Choose Santa Marta for

  • beaches
  • nature and the outdoors
  • nightlife

What lies behind each score is written up on Santa Marta’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. Luxor 6, Santa Marta 70: Santa Marta leads by 64 points.
Food & drink. Luxor 30, Santa Marta 44: Santa Marta leads by 14 points.
Culture & sights. Luxor 95, Santa Marta 34: Luxor leads by 61 points.
Nightlife. Luxor 10, Santa Marta 50: Santa Marta leads by 40 points.
Nature & outdoors. Luxor 32, Santa Marta 84: Santa Marta leads by 52 points.
Day trips. Luxor 62, Santa Marta 38: Luxor leads by 24 points.
Good for families. Luxor 30, Santa Marta 40: Santa Marta leads by 10 points.
Getting around. Luxor 35, Santa Marta 38: Santa Marta leads by 3 points.
Shopping & style. Luxor 25, Santa Marta 27: Santa Marta leads by 2 points.
Affordability. Luxor 90, Santa Marta 80: Luxor leads by 10 points.
Live music & performing arts. Luxor 10, Santa Marta 17: Santa Marta leads by 7 points.
Wellness & relaxation. Luxor 28, Santa Marta 30: Santa Marta leads by 2 points.
0255075100

What lies behind each score is written up on the two cities’ own pages: Luxor and Santa Marta.

Your match

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

Luxor
38match

Wins on culture and sights and day trips with your weighting.

Santa Marta
Best match
46match

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

What matters to you?

When should you go?

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

Luxor in July

41 °Cdaytime high
27 °Cnight-time low
0 mmrain in the month
No recordsunshine a day
No seasea
14 hdaylight a day

Santa Marta in July

32 °Cdaytime high
26 °Cnight-time low
59 mmrain in the month
8 hsunshine a day
28 °Csea
13 hdaylight a day

Daytime high, °C

0°10°20°30°40°50°JFMAMJJASOND

Rainfall in the month, mm

0255075100125JFMAMJJASOND
LuxorSanta Marta

Where the figures come from

Luxor 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. Luxor: 1998-2020 (rainfall 1991-2020) normals, Luxor (6.5 km from centre). Santa Marta: 1991-2020 normals, Santa Marta / Simon Bolivar (11.9 km from centre).

Before you go

MeasureLuxorSanta Marta
Official languageArabicSpanish
CurrencyEgyptian Pound (EGP)Colombian Peso (COP)
SocketsCF220 V, 50 HzAB110 V, 60 Hz
Driving sideRightRight
Time zoneUTC+2, UTC+3 in summerUTC-5
Emergency numberPolice 122, ambulance 123, fire 180123
Elevation89 m8 m
Main airportLuxor International Airport (LXR)7 km from centre29 non-stop destinationsSimón Bolívar International Airport (SMR)13 km from centre6 non-stop destinations
Public holidays this year15 days19 days

By the numbers

MeasureLuxorSanta Marta
City population202,232505,915
People per km²4861,723
Museums within 10 km43
UNESCO World Heritage sites within 50 km10
Swim season, months above 21 °C-12 months

Where else could you go?

Every comparison below shares a destination with this one, so you can follow Luxor or Santa Marta 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). Public holidays from Nager.Date (MIT). 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. Exchange rates via Frankfurter, based on European Central Bank reference rates.

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 2026-11-01. Daily budgets are estimates from country price levels.