VacationSelector
A lifeguard stand on South Beach, Miami
MiamiA lifeguard stand on South Beach
The Sanctuary of Truth by the sea, Pattaya
PattayaThe Sanctuary of Truth by the sea

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

Miami 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 Miami for

  • shopping
  • culture and sights
  • live music and the arts

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

Choose Pattaya for

  • prices
  • wellness
  • day trips

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. Miami 90, Pattaya 66: Miami leads by 24 points.
Food & drink. Miami 72, Pattaya 58: Miami leads by 14 points.
Culture & sights. Miami 57, Pattaya 30: Miami leads by 27 points.
Nightlife. Miami 82, Pattaya 76: Miami leads by 6 points.
Nature & outdoors. Miami 64, Pattaya 40: Miami leads by 24 points.
Day trips. Miami 42, Pattaya 52: Pattaya leads by 10 points.
Good for families. Miami 64, Pattaya 55: Miami leads by 9 points.
Getting around. Miami 35, Pattaya 36: Pattaya leads by 1 points.
Shopping & style. Miami 71, Pattaya 42: Miami leads by 29 points.
Affordability. Miami 27, Pattaya 84: Pattaya leads by 57 points.
Live music & performing arts. Miami 55, Pattaya 30: Miami leads by 25 points.
Wellness & relaxation. Miami 44, Pattaya 58: Pattaya leads by 14 points.
0255075100

What lies behind each score is written up on the two cities’ own pages: Miami and Pattaya.

Your match

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

Miami
Best match
59match

Wins on shopping and culture and sights with your weighting.

Pattaya
52match

Wins on prices 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.

Miami in July

33 °Cdaytime high
25 °Cnight-time low
186 mmrain in the month
No recordsunshine a day
29 °Csea
14 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
MiamiPattaya

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. Miami: 1991-2020 normals, Miami International Airport (10 km from centre). Pattaya: 1971-2000 (sunshine 1961-1990, rainfall 1991-2020) normals, Sattahip (31.2 km from centre).

Before you go

MeasureMiamiPattaya
Official language-Thai
CurrencyUS Dollar (USD)Baht (THB)
SocketsAB120 V, 60 HzABCF220 V, 50 Hz
Driving sideRightLeft
Time zoneUTC-5, UTC-4 in summerUTC+7
Emergency number911Police 191, ambulance 1669, fire 199
Elevation2 m35 m
Main airportMiami International Airport (MIA)7 km from centre198 non-stop destinationsSuvarnabhumi Airport (BKK)83 km from centre150 non-stop destinations
Public holidays this year11 days-

By the numbers

MeasureMiamiPattaya
City population442,241119,532
People per km²3,046-
Museums within 10 km170
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 Miami 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.