VacationSelector
A bright beach on turquoise water at Montego Bay, Montego Bay
Montego BayA bright beach on turquoise water at Montego Bay
Brooklyn Bridge and Lower Manhattan, New York
New YorkBrooklyn Bridge and Lower Manhattan

Photos: Montego Bay by Dre Dawkcide, Pexels License; New York by Jakub Hałun, CC BY 4.0, cropped.

Montego Bay or New York?

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 Montego Bay for

  • beaches
  • prices
  • nature and the outdoors

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

Choose New York for

  • shopping
  • live music and the arts
  • getting around

What lies behind each score is written up on New York’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. Montego Bay 84, New York 50: Montego Bay leads by 34 points.
Food & drink. Montego Bay 50, New York 92: New York leads by 42 points.
Culture & sights. Montego Bay 28, New York 89: New York leads by 61 points.
Nightlife. Montego Bay 42, New York 97: New York leads by 55 points.
Nature & outdoors. Montego Bay 65, New York 55: Montego Bay leads by 10 points.
Day trips. Montego Bay 50, New York 68: New York leads by 18 points.
Good for families. Montego Bay 48, New York 70: New York leads by 22 points.
Getting around. Montego Bay 20, New York 82: New York leads by 62 points.
Shopping & style. Montego Bay 25, New York 97: New York leads by 72 points.
Affordability. Montego Bay 38, New York 12: Montego Bay leads by 26 points.
Live music & performing arts. Montego Bay 32, New York 99: New York leads by 67 points.
Wellness & relaxation. Montego Bay 45, New York 42: Montego Bay leads by 3 points.
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What lies behind each score is written up on the two cities’ own pages: Montego Bay and New York.

Your match

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

Montego Bay
44match

Wins on beaches and prices with your weighting.

New York
Best match
71match

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

What matters to you?

When should you go?

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

Montego Bay in July

34 °Cdaytime high
25 °Cnight-time low
75 mmrain in the month
9 hsunshine a day
29 °Csea
13 hdaylight a day

New York in July

30 °Cdaytime high
22 °Cnight-time low
107 mmrain in the month
No recordsunshine a day
22 °Csea
15 hdaylight a day

Daytime high, °C

0°10°20°30°40°JFMAMJJASOND

Rainfall in the month, mm

050100150200JFMAMJJASOND
Montego BayNew York

Temperature and rainfall are climate normals, averaged over the years shown. Montego Bay: 1991-2020 normals, Montego Bay / Sangster (3.7 km from centre). New York: 1991-2020 normals, LaGuardia Airport (12.9 km from centre).

Before you go

MeasureMontego BayNew York
Official languageEnglish, Jamaican Patois-
CurrencyJamaican Dollar (JMD)US Dollar (USD)
SocketsAB116 V, 50 HzAB120 V, 60 Hz
Driving sideLeftRight
Time zoneUTC-5UTC-5, UTC-4 in summer
Emergency numberPolice 110/112/119/911, ambulance 110, fire 110911
Elevation19 m25 m
Main airportSangster International Airport (MBJ)4 km from centre48 non-stop destinationsJohn F. Kennedy International Airport (JFK)21 km from centre189 non-stop destinations
Public holidays this year10 days13 days

By the numbers

MeasureMontego BayNew York
City population123,9948,804,190
People per km²-7,256
Museums within 10 km0157
UNESCO World Heritage sites within 50 km02
Swim season, months above 21 °C12 months3 months

Where else could you go?

Every comparison below shares a destination with this one, so you can follow Montego Bay or New York somewhere new.

Browse every destination

Sources

Ground elevations sampled from the Mapzen terrain tiles via OpenTopoData, merging SRTM, ASTER, NED, EU-DEM and national 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). 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. Exchange rates via Frankfurter, based on European Central Bank reference rates. 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.