VacationSelector
The railway viaduct over the canal, Castlefield, Manchester
ManchesterThe railway viaduct over the canal, Castlefield
The Treasury, Al-Khazneh, cut into the rock, Petra
PetraThe Treasury, Al-Khazneh, cut into the rock

Photos: Manchester by IIya Kuzhekin, CC BY 3.0, cropped; Petra by Yasir Gürbüz, Pexels License.

Manchester or Petra?

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 Manchester for

  • nightlife
  • live music and the arts
  • day trips

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

Choose Petra for

  • culture and sights
  • nature and the outdoors
  • wellness

What lies behind each score is written up on Petra’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. Manchester 9, Petra 5: Manchester leads by 4 points.
Food & drink. Manchester 51, Petra 22: Manchester leads by 29 points.
Culture & sights. Manchester 50, Petra 85: Petra leads by 35 points.
Nightlife. Manchester 72, Petra 5: Manchester leads by 67 points.
Nature & outdoors. Manchester 64, Petra 78: Petra leads by 14 points.
Day trips. Manchester 77, Petra 30: Manchester leads by 47 points.
Good for families. Manchester 58, Petra 25: Manchester leads by 33 points.
Getting around. Manchester 68, Petra 25: Manchester leads by 43 points.
Shopping & style. Manchester 62, Petra 18: Manchester leads by 44 points.
Affordability. Manchester 42, Petra 45: Petra leads by 3 points.
Live music & performing arts. Manchester 74, Petra 10: Manchester leads by 64 points.
Wellness & relaxation. Manchester 15, Petra 28: Petra leads by 13 points.
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What lies behind each score is written up on the two cities’ own pages: Manchester and Petra.

Your match

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

Manchester
Best match
54match

Wins on nightlife and live music and the arts with your weighting.

Petra
31match

Wins on culture and sights 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.

Manchester in July

21 °Cdaytime high
13 °Cnight-time low
60 mmrain in the month
6 hsunshine a day
16 °Csea
17 hdaylight a day

Petra in July

35 °Cdaytime high
19 °Cnight-time low
0 mmrain in the month
12 hsunshine a day
No seasea
14 hdaylight a day

Daytime high, °C

0°10°20°30°40°JFMAMJJASOND

Rainfall in the month, mm

020406080100JFMAMJJASOND
ManchesterPetra

Where the figures come from

Petra's temperatures are measured 34 km from the centre, at Ma'An.

Petra's station stands 219 m above the city centre, so the centre is likely a little warmer than the figures say.

Petra 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. Manchester: 1991-2020 normals, Manchester Airport (14.8 km from centre). Petra: 1991-2020 normals, Ma'An (33.9 km from centre).

Before you go

MeasureManchesterPetra
Official languageEnglishArabic
CurrencyPound Sterling (GBP)Jordanian Dinar (JOD)
SocketsG230 V, 50 HzBCFGJ230 V, 50 Hz
Driving sideLeftRight
Time zoneUTC, UTC+1 in summerUTC+3
Emergency number112 or 999911
Elevation38 m850 m
Main airportManchester Airport (MAN)15 km from centre211 non-stop destinationsKing Hussein International Airport (AQJ)90 km from centre5 non-stop destinations
Public holidays this year8 days-

By the numbers

MeasureManchesterPetra
City population547,627-
People per km²4,737-
Museums within 10 km282
UNESCO World Heritage sites within 50 km21
Swim season, months above 21 °CNone-

Where else could you go?

Every comparison below shares a destination with this one, so you can follow Manchester or Petra 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 2026-10-31. Daily budgets are estimates from country price levels.