VacationSelector
The Manila Central Post Office on the Pasig, Manila
ManilaThe Manila Central Post Office on the Pasig
The pink Don CeSar hotel seen from the beach, St. Pete Beach
St. Pete BeachThe pink Don CeSar hotel seen from the beach

Photos: Manila by Kenneth Surillo, Pexels License; St. Pete Beach by Jeffrey Eisen, Pexels License.

Manila or St. Pete Beach?

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 Manila for

  • prices
  • shopping
  • culture and sights

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

Choose St. Pete Beach for

  • beaches
  • families
  • nature and the outdoors

What lies behind each score is written up on St. Pete Beach’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. Manila 12, St. Pete Beach 87: St. Pete Beach leads by 75 points.
Food & drink. Manila 64, St. Pete Beach 40: Manila leads by 24 points.
Culture & sights. Manila 54, St. Pete Beach 18: Manila leads by 36 points.
Nightlife. Manila 64, St. Pete Beach 28: Manila leads by 36 points.
Nature & outdoors. Manila 40, St. Pete Beach 57: St. Pete Beach leads by 17 points.
Day trips. Manila 42, St. Pete Beach 58: St. Pete Beach leads by 16 points.
Good for families. Manila 42, St. Pete Beach 72: St. Pete Beach leads by 30 points.
Getting around. Manila 26, St. Pete Beach 30: St. Pete Beach leads by 4 points.
Shopping & style. Manila 60, St. Pete Beach 20: Manila leads by 40 points.
Affordability. Manila 77, St. Pete Beach 32: Manila leads by 45 points.
Live music & performing arts. Manila 50, St. Pete Beach 20: Manila leads by 30 points.
Wellness & relaxation. Manila 40, St. Pete Beach 42: St. Pete Beach leads by 2 points.
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What lies behind each score is written up on the two cities’ own pages: Manila and St. Pete Beach.

Your match

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

Manila
Best match
48match

Wins on prices and shopping with your weighting.

St. Pete Beach
42match

Wins on beaches 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.

Manila in July

32 °Cdaytime high
25 °Cnight-time low
487 mmrain in the month
No recordsunshine a day
29 °Csea
13 hdaylight a day

St. Pete Beach in July

32 °Cdaytime high
26 °Cnight-time low
185 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

0200400600JFMAMJJASOND
ManilaSt. Pete Beach

Where the figures come from

St. Pete Beach 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.

St. Pete Beach's sunshine is measured 34 km from the centre, at Tampa International Airport.

Temperature and rainfall are climate normals, averaged over the years shown. Manila: 1991-2020 normals, Science Garden (6 km from centre). St. Pete Beach: 1998-2020 (sunshine 1991-2020, rainfall 1991-2020) normals, Saint Petersburg (12.2 km from centre).

Before you go

MeasureManilaSt. Pete Beach
Official languageEnglish, Filipino, Taglish-
CurrencyPhilippine Peso (PHP)US Dollar (USD)
SocketsABC220 V, 60 HzAB120 V, 60 Hz
Driving sideRightRight
Time zoneUTC+8UTC-5, UTC-4 in summer
Emergency number911911
Elevation9 m2 m
Main airportNinoy Aquino International Airport (MNL)11 km from centre90 non-stop destinationsSt. Petersburg Clearwater International Airport (PIE)21 km from centre60 non-stop destinations
Public holidays this year18 days11 days

By the numbers

MeasureManilaSt. Pete Beach
City population1,902,5908,879
People per km²76,104173
Museums within 10 km272
UNESCO World Heritage sites within 50 km10
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 Manila or St. Pete Beach 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 2026-11-02. Daily budgets are estimates from country price levels.