VacationSelector
Botero sculptures on Plaza Botero, Medellin
MedellinBotero sculptures on Plaza Botero
The Sultan Qaboos Grand Mosque, Muscat
MuscatThe Sultan Qaboos Grand Mosque

Photos: Medellin by Steffen Schmitz, CC BY-SA 4.0, cropped; Muscat by Alli Khalil, CC BY 4.0, cropped.

Medellin or Muscat?

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 Medellin for

  • nightlife
  • getting around
  • prices

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

Choose Muscat for

  • beaches
  • wellness
  • culture and sights

What lies behind each score is written up on Muscat’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. Medellin 5, Muscat 72: Muscat leads by 67 points.
Food & drink. Medellin 58, Muscat 44: Medellin leads by 14 points.
Culture & sights. Medellin 42, Muscat 55: Muscat leads by 13 points.
Nightlife. Medellin 76, Muscat 14: Medellin leads by 62 points.
Nature & outdoors. Medellin 66, Muscat 70: Muscat leads by 4 points.
Day trips. Medellin 58, Muscat 62: Muscat leads by 4 points.
Good for families. Medellin 50, Muscat 52: Muscat leads by 2 points.
Getting around. Medellin 55, Muscat 20: Medellin leads by 35 points.
Shopping & style. Medellin 45, Muscat 42: Medellin leads by 3 points.
Affordability. Medellin 80, Muscat 45: Medellin leads by 35 points.
Live music & performing arts. Medellin 42, Muscat 40: Medellin leads by 2 points.
Wellness & relaxation. Medellin 30, Muscat 55: Muscat leads by 25 points.
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What lies behind each score is written up on the two cities’ own pages: Medellin and Muscat.

Your match

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

Medellin
Best match
51match

Wins on nightlife and getting around with your weighting.

Muscat
48match

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.

Medellin in July

29 °Cdaytime high
16 °Cnight-time low
133 mmrain in the month
No recordsunshine a day
No seasea
12 hdaylight a day

Muscat in July

33 °Cdaytime high
30 °Cnight-time low
0 mmrain in the month
9 hsunshine a day
31 °Csea
13 hdaylight a day

Daytime high, °C

0°10°20°30°40°JFMAMJJASOND

Rainfall in the month, mm

0100200300400JFMAMJJASOND
MedellinMuscat

Where the figures come from

Medellin 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.

Muscat's sunshine is measured 32 km from the centre, at Seeb, International Airport.

Temperature and rainfall are climate normals, averaged over the years shown. Medellin: 1958-2025 (rainfall 1991-2020) normals, Medellin / Olaya Herrera (5.2 km from centre). Muscat: 1991-2020 normals, Qaboos Port (3.4 km from centre).

Before you go

MeasureMedellinMuscat
Official languageSpanishArabic
CurrencyColombian Peso (COP)Rial Omani (OMR)
SocketsAB110 V, 60 HzCG240 V, 50 Hz
Driving sideRightRight
Time zoneUTC-5UTC+4
Emergency number123968
Elevation1,405 m69 m
Main airportJose Maria Córdova International Airport (MDE)19 km from centre41 non-stop destinationsMuscat International Airport (MCT)31 km from centre83 non-stop destinations
Public holidays this year19 days-

By the numbers

MeasureMedellinMuscat
City population2,529,4031,421,409
People per km²6,644406
Museums within 10 km1410
UNESCO World Heritage sites within 50 km00
Swim season, months above 21 °C-12 months

Where else could you go?

Every comparison below shares a destination with this one, so you can follow Medellin or Muscat 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. Airport data from OurAirports (public domain). Public holidays from Nager.Date (MIT). 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. Sea surface temperature from NOAA OISST v2.1, NOAA Physical Sciences Laboratory. Daylight hours computed from each destination's latitude using the NOAA solar position algorithm. Exchange rates via Frankfurter, based on European Central Bank reference rates.

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.