VacationSelector
Flinders Street Station, Melbourne
MelbourneFlinders Street Station
Minato Mirai and the Cosmo Clock, Yokohama
YokohamaMinato Mirai and the Cosmo Clock

Photos: Melbourne by Medelam, CC BY-SA 4.0, cropped; Yokohama by Yoshio Kohara, CC BY 3.0, cropped.

Melbourne or Yokohama?

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 Melbourne for

  • nightlife
  • live music and the arts
  • shopping

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

Choose Yokohama for

  • day trips
  • prices
  • families

What lies behind each score is written up on Yokohama’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. Melbourne 50, Yokohama 46: Melbourne leads by 4 points.
Food & drink. Melbourne 75, Yokohama 72: Melbourne leads by 3 points.
Culture & sights. Melbourne 57, Yokohama 55: Melbourne leads by 2 points.
Nightlife. Melbourne 75, Yokohama 44: Melbourne leads by 31 points.
Nature & outdoors. Melbourne 70, Yokohama 66: Melbourne leads by 4 points.
Day trips. Melbourne 62, Yokohama 86: Yokohama leads by 24 points.
Good for families. Melbourne 73, Yokohama 86: Yokohama leads by 13 points.
Getting around. Melbourne 76, Yokohama 87: Yokohama leads by 11 points.
Shopping & style. Melbourne 70, Yokohama 60: Melbourne leads by 10 points.
Affordability. Melbourne 31, Yokohama 55: Yokohama leads by 24 points.
Live music & performing arts. Melbourne 72, Yokohama 56: Melbourne leads by 16 points.
Wellness & relaxation. Melbourne 54, Yokohama 60: Yokohama leads by 6 points.
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What lies behind each score is written up on the two cities’ own pages: Melbourne and Yokohama.

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

Melbourne
64match

Wins on nightlife and live music and the arts with your weighting.

Yokohama
64match

Wins on day trips and prices with your weighting.

What matters to you?

When should you go?

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

Melbourne in July

14 °Cdaytime high
6 °Cnight-time low
46 mmrain in the month
4 hsunshine a day
12 °Csea
10 hdaylight a day

Yokohama in July

28 °Cdaytime high
22 °Cnight-time low
145 mmrain in the month
5 hsunshine a day
24 °Csea
14 hdaylight a day

Daytime high, °C

0°10°20°30°40°JFMAMJJASOND

Rainfall in the month, mm

050100150200250JFMAMJJASOND
MelbourneYokohama

Where the figures come from

Yokohama's sunshine is measured 29 km from the centre, at Tokyo.

Temperature and rainfall are climate normals, averaged over the years shown. Melbourne: 1991-2020 normals, Latrobe University / Kingsbury (13.1 km from centre). Yokohama: 1971-2000 (sunshine 1991-2020) normals, Yokohama (1.6 km from centre).

Before you go

MeasureMelbourneYokohama
Official languageEnglishJapanese
CurrencyAustralian Dollar (AUD)Yen (JPY)
SocketsI230 V, 50 HzAB100 V, 50 and 60 Hz depending on the region
Driving sideLeftLeft
Time zoneUTC+10, UTC+11 in summerUTC+9
Emergency number000Police 110, fire 119
Elevation31 m24 m
Main airportMelbourne Airport (MEL)19 km from centre69 non-stop destinationsTokyo Haneda International Airport (HND)18 km from centre98 non-stop destinations
Public holidays this year13 days16 days

By the numbers

MeasureMelbourneYokohama
City population5,350,7053,757,630
People per km²5358,585
Museums within 10 km4338
UNESCO World Heritage sites within 50 km11
Swim season, months above 21 °CNone5 months

Where else could you go?

Every comparison below shares a destination with this one, so you can follow Melbourne or Yokohama 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 2026-10-31. Daily budgets are estimates from country price levels.