VacationSelector
Colourful houses in the old town, Mazatlan
MazatlanColourful houses in the old town
The Sanctuary of Truth by the sea, Pattaya
PattayaThe Sanctuary of Truth by the sea

Photos: Mazatlan by Gzzz, CC BY-SA 4.0, cropped; Pattaya by Matrix, Pexels License.

Mazatlan or Pattaya?

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 Mazatlan for

  • nature and the outdoors
  • beaches
  • culture and sights

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

Choose Pattaya for

  • wellness
  • nightlife
  • prices

What lies behind each score is written up on Pattaya’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. Mazatlan 80, Pattaya 66: Mazatlan leads by 14 points.
Food & drink. Mazatlan 62, Pattaya 58: Mazatlan leads by 4 points.
Culture & sights. Mazatlan 42, Pattaya 30: Mazatlan leads by 12 points.
Nightlife. Mazatlan 55, Pattaya 76: Pattaya leads by 21 points.
Nature & outdoors. Mazatlan 66, Pattaya 40: Mazatlan leads by 26 points.
Day trips. Mazatlan 45, Pattaya 52: Pattaya leads by 7 points.
Good for families. Mazatlan 60, Pattaya 55: Mazatlan leads by 5 points.
Getting around. Mazatlan 42, Pattaya 36: Mazatlan leads by 6 points.
Shopping & style. Mazatlan 30, Pattaya 42: Pattaya leads by 12 points.
Affordability. Mazatlan 70, Pattaya 84: Pattaya leads by 14 points.
Live music & performing arts. Mazatlan 40, Pattaya 30: Mazatlan leads by 10 points.
Wellness & relaxation. Mazatlan 35, Pattaya 58: Pattaya leads by 23 points.
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What lies behind each score is written up on the two cities’ own pages: Mazatlan and Pattaya.

Your match

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

Too close to call, level with your weighting

Mazatlan
52match

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

Pattaya
52match

Wins on wellness and nightlife with your weighting.

What matters to you?

When should you go?

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

Mazatlan in July

34 °Cdaytime high
26 °Cnight-time low
153 mmrain in the month
8 hsunshine a day
29 °Csea
13 hdaylight a day

Pattaya in July

32 °Cdaytime high
26 °Cnight-time low
102 mmrain in the month
6 hsunshine a day
30 °Csea
13 hdaylight a day

Daytime high, °C

0°10°20°30°40°JFMAMJJASOND

Rainfall in the month, mm

0100200300JFMAMJJASOND
MazatlanPattaya

Where the figures come from

Pattaya's temperatures are measured 31 km from the centre, at Sattahip.

Pattaya 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.

Pattaya's sunshine is measured 86 km from the centre, at Bangna Agromet / Ban Khlong Samrong.

Temperature and rainfall are climate normals, averaged over the years shown. Mazatlan: 1991-2020 normals, Colonia Juan Carras-Co Mazatlan, Sin. (2 km from centre). Pattaya: 1971-2000 (sunshine 1961-1990, rainfall 1991-2020) normals, Sattahip (31.2 km from centre).

Before you go

MeasureMazatlanPattaya
Official languageSpanish, Nahuatl, Yucatec MayaThai
CurrencyMexican Peso (MXN)Baht (THB)
SocketsAB127 V, 60 HzABCF220 V, 50 Hz
Driving sideRightLeft
Time zoneUTC-7UTC+7
Emergency number911Police 191, ambulance 1669, fire 199
Elevation139 m35 m
Main airportGeneral Rafael Buelna International Airport (MZT)16 km from centre23 non-stop destinationsSuvarnabhumi Airport (BKK)83 km from centre150 non-stop destinations
Public holidays this year9 days-

By the numbers

MeasureMazatlanPattaya
City population441,975119,532
Museums within 10 km30
UNESCO World Heritage sites within 50 km00
Swim season, months above 21 °C12 months12 months

Where else could you go?

Every comparison below shares a destination with this one, so you can follow Mazatlan or Pattaya 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.