VacationSelector
The opera house on Place de la Comédie, Montpellier
MontpellierThe opera house on Place de la Comédie
The cathedral facade, Siena
SienaThe cathedral facade

Photos: Montpellier by Peter, CC BY 2.0, cropped; Siena by Raimond Spekking, CC BY-SA 4.0, cropped.

Montpellier or Siena?

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
  • nightlife
  • live music and the arts

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

Choose Siena for

  • culture and sights
  • wellness
  • day trips

What lies behind each score is written up on Siena’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, Siena 14: Montpellier leads by 50 points.
Food & drink. Montpellier 64, Siena 62: Montpellier leads by 2 points.
Culture & sights. Montpellier 60, Siena 78: Siena leads by 18 points.
Nightlife. Montpellier 56, Siena 27: Montpellier leads by 29 points.
Nature & outdoors. Montpellier 72, Siena 65: Montpellier leads by 7 points.
Day trips. Montpellier 85, Siena 94: Siena leads by 9 points.
Good for families. Montpellier 62, Siena 38: Montpellier leads by 24 points.
Getting around. Montpellier 74, Siena 60: Montpellier leads by 14 points.
Shopping & style. Montpellier 47, Siena 35: Montpellier leads by 12 points.
Affordability. Montpellier 50, Siena 42: Montpellier leads by 8 points.
Live music & performing arts. Montpellier 63, Siena 36: Montpellier leads by 27 points.
Wellness & relaxation. Montpellier 42, Siena 55: Siena leads by 13 points.
0255075100

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

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 nightlife with your weighting.

Siena
51match

Wins on culture and sights 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.

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

Siena in July

31 °Cdaytime high
17 °Cnight-time low
27 mmrain in the month
No recordsunshine a day
No seasea
15 hdaylight a day

Daytime high, °C

0°10°20°30°40°JFMAMJJASOND

Rainfall in the month, mm

050100150JFMAMJJASOND
MontpellierSiena

Where the figures come from

Siena's temperatures are measured 45 km from the centre, at Arezzo.

Siena 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). Siena: 2006-2017 (rainfall 1991-2020) normals, Arezzo (45 km from centre).

Before you go

MeasureMontpellierSiena
Official languageFrenchItalian
CurrencyEuro (EUR)Euro (EUR)
SocketsCE230 V, 50 HzCFL230 V, 50 Hz
Driving sideRightRight
Time zoneUTC+1, UTC+2 in summerUTC+1, UTC+2 in summer
Emergency number112112
Elevation7 m322 m
Main airportMontpellier-Méditerranée Airport (MPL)8 km from centre41 non-stop destinationsFlorence Airport, Peretola (FLR)55 km from centre46 non-stop destinations
Public holidays this year11 days13 days

By the numbers

MeasureMontpellierSiena
City population310,24052,812
People per km²5,452446
Museums within 10 km1430
UNESCO World Heritage sites within 50 km25
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 Siena 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.