VacationSelector
The railway viaduct over the canal, Castlefield, Manchester
ManchesterThe railway viaduct over the canal, Castlefield
Fishermen on the rocks at Playa Santa Teresa at sunset, Santa Teresa, Costa Rica
Santa Teresa, Costa RicaFishermen on the rocks at Playa Santa Teresa at sunset

Photos: Manchester by IIya Kuzhekin, CC BY 3.0, cropped; Santa Teresa, Costa Rica by Christopher Crouzet, CC BY-SA 4.0, cropped.

Manchester or Santa Teresa, Costa Rica?

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

  • live music and the arts
  • day trips
  • getting around

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

Choose Santa Teresa, Costa Rica for

  • beaches
  • wellness
  • nature and the outdoors

What lies behind each score is written up on Santa Teresa, Costa Rica’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, Santa Teresa, Costa Rica 84: Santa Teresa, Costa Rica leads by 75 points.
Food & drink. Manchester 51, Santa Teresa, Costa Rica 40: Manchester leads by 11 points.
Culture & sights. Manchester 50, Santa Teresa, Costa Rica 4: Manchester leads by 46 points.
Nightlife. Manchester 72, Santa Teresa, Costa Rica 30: Manchester leads by 42 points.
Nature & outdoors. Manchester 64, Santa Teresa, Costa Rica 78: Santa Teresa, Costa Rica leads by 14 points.
Day trips. Manchester 77, Santa Teresa, Costa Rica 12: Manchester leads by 65 points.
Good for families. Manchester 58, Santa Teresa, Costa Rica 35: Manchester leads by 23 points.
Getting around. Manchester 68, Santa Teresa, Costa Rica 15: Manchester leads by 53 points.
Shopping & style. Manchester 62, Santa Teresa, Costa Rica 12: Manchester leads by 50 points.
Affordability. Manchester 42, Santa Teresa, Costa Rica 25: Manchester leads by 17 points.
Live music & performing arts. Manchester 74, Santa Teresa, Costa Rica 8: Manchester leads by 66 points.
Wellness & relaxation. Manchester 15, Santa Teresa, Costa Rica 70: Santa Teresa, Costa Rica leads by 55 points.
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What lies behind each score is written up on the two cities’ own pages: Manchester and Santa Teresa, Costa Rica.

Your match

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

Manchester
Best match
54match

Wins on live music and the arts and day trips with your weighting.

Santa Teresa, Costa Rica
34match

Wins on beaches and wellness 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

Santa Teresa, Costa Rica in July

33 °Cdaytime high
23 °Cnight-time low
218 mmrain in the month
5 hsunshine a day
29 °Csea
13 hdaylight a day

Daytime high, °C

0°10°20°30°40°JFMAMJJASOND

Rainfall in the month, mm

0100200300400500JFMAMJJASOND
ManchesterSanta Teresa, Costa Rica

Where the figures come from

Santa Teresa, Costa Rica's temperatures are measured 52 km from the centre, at Puntarenas.

Santa Teresa, Costa Rica 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). Santa Teresa, Costa Rica: 1961-1990 (rainfall 1991-2020) normals, Puntarenas (51.5 km from centre).

Before you go

MeasureManchesterSanta Teresa, Costa Rica
Official languageEnglishSpanish
CurrencyPound Sterling (GBP)Costa Rican Colon (CRC)
SocketsG230 V, 50 HzAB120 V, 60 Hz
Driving sideLeftRight
Time zoneUTC, UTC+1 in summerUTC-6
Emergency number112 or 999911
Elevation38 m19 m
Main airportManchester Airport (MAN)15 km from centre211 non-stop destinationsDaniel Oduber Quirós International Airport (LIR)113 km from centre30 non-stop destinations
Public holidays this year8 days11 days

By the numbers

MeasureManchesterSanta Teresa, Costa Rica
City population547,627-
People per km²4,737-
Museums within 10 km280
UNESCO World Heritage sites within 50 km20
Swim season, months above 21 °CNone12 months

Where else could you go?

Every comparison below shares a destination with this one, so you can follow Manchester or Santa Teresa, Costa Rica 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. Ground elevations sampled from the Mapzen terrain tiles via OpenTopoData, merging SRTM, ASTER, NED, EU-DEM and national sources. 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 2026-11-02. Daily budgets are estimates from country price levels.