VacationSelector
A bright beach on turquoise water at Montego Bay, Montego Bay
Montego BayA bright beach on turquoise water at Montego Bay
The towers of Panama City reflected in the bay in golden light, Panama City
Panama CityThe towers of Panama City reflected in the bay in golden light

Photos: Montego Bay by Dre Dawkcide, Pexels License; Panama City by Ayaita, CC BY-SA 3.0, cropped.

Montego Bay or Panama City?

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
  • wellness
  • families

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

Choose Panama City for

  • culture and sights
  • shopping
  • nightlife

What lies behind each score is written up on Panama City’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, Panama City 44: Montego Bay leads by 40 points.
Food & drink. Montego Bay 50, Panama City 57: Panama City leads by 7 points.
Culture & sights. Montego Bay 28, Panama City 62: Panama City leads by 34 points.
Nightlife. Montego Bay 42, Panama City 62: Panama City leads by 20 points.
Nature & outdoors. Montego Bay 65, Panama City 74: Panama City leads by 9 points.
Day trips. Montego Bay and Panama City are level on 50.
Good for families. Montego Bay 48, Panama City 45: Montego Bay leads by 3 points.
Getting around. Montego Bay 20, Panama City 40: Panama City leads by 20 points.
Shopping & style. Montego Bay 25, Panama City 52: Panama City leads by 27 points.
Affordability. Montego Bay 38, Panama City 55: Panama City leads by 17 points.
Live music & performing arts. Montego Bay 32, Panama City 34: Panama City leads by 2 points.
Wellness & relaxation. Montego Bay 45, Panama City 22: Montego Bay leads by 23 points.
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What lies behind each score is written up on the two cities’ own pages: Montego Bay and Panama City.

Your match

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

Montego Bay
44match

Wins on beaches and wellness with your weighting.

Panama City
Best match
50match

Wins on culture and sights and shopping 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

Panama City in July

31 °Cdaytime high
24 °Cnight-time low
161 mmrain in the month
No recordsunshine a day
29 °Csea
13 hdaylight a day

Daytime high, °C

0°10°20°30°40°JFMAMJJASOND

Rainfall in the month, mm

0100200300400500JFMAMJJASOND
Montego BayPanama City

Where the figures come from

Panama City 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.

Temperature and rainfall are climate normals, averaged over the years shown. Montego Bay: 1991-2020 normals, Montego Bay / Sangster (3.7 km from centre). Panama City: 1991-2020 normals, Tocumen (20.4 km from centre).

Before you go

MeasureMontego BayPanama City
Official languageEnglish, Jamaican PatoisSpanish
CurrencyJamaican Dollar (JMD)Balboa (PAB)
SocketsAB116 V, 50 HzAB110 V, 60 Hz
Driving sideLeftRight
Time zoneUTC-5UTC-5
Emergency numberPolice 110/112/119/911, ambulance 110, fire 110911
Elevation19 m20 m
Main airportSangster International Airport (MBJ)4 km from centre48 non-stop destinationsTocumen International Airport (PTY)20 km from centre92 non-stop destinations
Public holidays this year10 days14 days

By the numbers

MeasureMontego BayPanama City
City population123,9941,540,000
People per km²-5,600
Museums within 10 km010
UNESCO World Heritage sites within 50 km02
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 Montego Bay or Panama City 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. 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 2026-11-01. Daily budgets are estimates from country price levels.