VacationSelector
The opera house on Place de la Comédie, Montpellier
MontpellierThe opera house on Place de la Comédie
The Treasury, Al-Khazneh, cut into the rock, Petra
PetraThe Treasury, Al-Khazneh, cut into the rock

Photos: Montpellier by Peter, CC BY 2.0, cropped; Petra by Yasir Gürbüz, Pexels License.

Montpellier or Petra?

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 Montpellier for

  • beaches
  • day trips
  • live music and the arts

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

Choose Petra for

  • culture and sights
  • nature and the outdoors

What lies behind each score is written up on Petra’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. Montpellier 64, Petra 5: Montpellier leads by 59 points.
Food & drink. Montpellier 64, Petra 22: Montpellier leads by 42 points.
Culture & sights. Montpellier 60, Petra 85: Petra leads by 25 points.
Nightlife. Montpellier 56, Petra 5: Montpellier leads by 51 points.
Nature & outdoors. Montpellier 72, Petra 78: Petra leads by 6 points.
Day trips. Montpellier 85, Petra 30: Montpellier leads by 55 points.
Good for families. Montpellier 62, Petra 25: Montpellier leads by 37 points.
Getting around. Montpellier 74, Petra 25: Montpellier leads by 49 points.
Shopping & style. Montpellier 47, Petra 18: Montpellier leads by 29 points.
Affordability. Montpellier 50, Petra 45: Montpellier leads by 5 points.
Live music & performing arts. Montpellier 63, Petra 10: Montpellier leads by 53 points.
Wellness & relaxation. Montpellier 42, Petra 28: Montpellier leads by 14 points.
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What lies behind each score is written up on the two cities’ own pages: Montpellier and Petra.

Your match

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

Montpellier
Best match
62match

Wins on beaches and day trips with your weighting.

Petra
31match

Wins on culture and sights and nature and the outdoors with your weighting.

What matters to you?

When should you go?

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

Montpellier in July

30 °Cdaytime high
19 °Cnight-time low
17 mmrain in the month
11 hsunshine a day
21 °Csea
15 hdaylight a day

Petra in July

35 °Cdaytime high
19 °Cnight-time low
0 mmrain in the month
12 hsunshine a day
No seasea
14 hdaylight a day

Daytime high, °C

0°10°20°30°40°JFMAMJJASOND

Rainfall in the month, mm

020406080100JFMAMJJASOND
MontpellierPetra

Where the figures come from

Petra's temperatures are measured 34 km from the centre, at Ma'An.

Petra's station stands 219 m above the city centre, so the centre is likely a little warmer than the figures say.

Petra 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. Montpellier: 1991-2020 normals, Montpellier (7.8 km from centre). Petra: 1991-2020 normals, Ma'An (33.9 km from centre).

Before you go

MeasureMontpellierPetra
Official languageFrenchArabic
CurrencyEuro (EUR)Jordanian Dinar (JOD)
SocketsCE230 V, 50 HzBCFGJ230 V, 50 Hz
Driving sideRightRight
Time zoneUTC+1, UTC+2 in summerUTC+3
Emergency number112911
Elevation7 m850 m
Main airportMontpellier-Méditerranée Airport (MPL)8 km from centre41 non-stop destinationsKing Hussein International Airport (AQJ)90 km from centre5 non-stop destinations
Public holidays this year11 days-

By the numbers

MeasureMontpellierPetra
City population310,240-
People per km²5,452-
Museums within 10 km142
UNESCO World Heritage sites within 50 km21
Swim season, months above 21 °C2 months-

Where else could you go?

Every comparison below shares a destination with this one, so you can follow Montpellier or Petra 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). Tourism statistics from Eurostat, © European Union, reused under CC BY 4.0. 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 2026-10-31. Daily budgets are estimates from country price levels.