VacationSelector
Colourful houses in the old town, Mazatlan
MazatlanColourful houses in the old town
The beach and the oceanfront hotels from the fishing pier, Virginia Beach
Virginia BeachThe beach and the oceanfront hotels from the fishing pier

Photos: Mazatlan by Gzzz, CC BY-SA 4.0, cropped; Virginia Beach by SchuminWeb, CC BY-SA 3.0, cropped.

Mazatlan or Virginia 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 Mazatlan for

  • prices
  • food and drink
  • nightlife

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

Choose Virginia Beach for

  • day trips
  • families
  • shopping

What lies behind each score is written up on Virginia 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. Mazatlan 80, Virginia Beach 77: Mazatlan leads by 3 points.
Food & drink. Mazatlan 62, Virginia Beach 42: Mazatlan leads by 20 points.
Culture & sights. Mazatlan 42, Virginia Beach 30: Mazatlan leads by 12 points.
Nightlife. Mazatlan 55, Virginia Beach 37: Mazatlan leads by 18 points.
Nature & outdoors. Mazatlan 66, Virginia Beach 56: Mazatlan leads by 10 points.
Day trips. Mazatlan 45, Virginia Beach 64: Virginia Beach leads by 19 points.
Good for families. Mazatlan 60, Virginia Beach 75: Virginia Beach leads by 15 points.
Getting around. Mazatlan 42, Virginia Beach 27: Mazatlan leads by 15 points.
Shopping & style. Mazatlan 30, Virginia Beach 32: Virginia Beach leads by 2 points.
Affordability. Mazatlan 70, Virginia Beach 40: Mazatlan leads by 30 points.
Live music & performing arts. Mazatlan 40, Virginia Beach 38: Mazatlan leads by 2 points.
Wellness & relaxation. Mazatlan 35, Virginia Beach 32: Mazatlan leads by 3 points.
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What lies behind each score is written up on the two cities’ own pages: Mazatlan and Virginia Beach.

Your match

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

Mazatlan
Best match
52match

Wins on prices and food and drink with your weighting.

Virginia Beach
46match

Wins on day trips 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.

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

Virginia Beach in July

31 °Cdaytime high
23 °Cnight-time low
152 mmrain in the month
No recordsunshine a day
25 °Csea
14 hdaylight a day

Daytime high, °C

0°10°20°30°40°JFMAMJJASOND

Rainfall in the month, mm

0100200300JFMAMJJASOND
MazatlanVirginia Beach

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). Virginia Beach: 1991-2020 normals, Virginia Beach / Gatewood Park (5.7 km from centre).

Before you go

MeasureMazatlanVirginia Beach
Official languageSpanish, Nahuatl, Yucatec Maya-
CurrencyMexican Peso (MXN)US Dollar (USD)
SocketsAB127 V, 60 HzAB120 V, 60 Hz
Driving sideRightRight
Time zoneUTC-7UTC-5, UTC-4 in summer
Emergency number911911
Elevation139 m7 m
Main airportGeneral Rafael Buelna International Airport (MZT)16 km from centre23 non-stop destinationsNorfolk International Airport (ORF)20 km from centre42 non-stop destinations
Public holidays this year9 days13 days

By the numbers

MeasureMazatlanVirginia Beach
City population441,975459,470
Museums within 10 km32
UNESCO World Heritage sites within 50 km00
Swim season, months above 21 °C12 months4 months

Where else could you go?

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