VacationSelector
The opera house on Place de la Comédie, Montpellier
MontpellierThe opera house on Place de la Comédie
Playa Tamarindo, Tamarindo
TamarindoPlaya Tamarindo

Photos: Montpellier by Peter, CC BY 2.0, cropped; Tamarindo by Jarle Naustvik, CC BY 2.0, cropped.

Montpellier or Tamarindo?

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

  • day trips
  • culture and sights
  • live music and the arts

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

Choose Tamarindo for

  • beaches
  • nature and the outdoors
  • wellness

What lies behind each score is written up on Tamarindo’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, Tamarindo 85: Tamarindo leads by 21 points.
Food & drink. Montpellier 64, Tamarindo 38: Montpellier leads by 26 points.
Culture & sights. Montpellier 60, Tamarindo 5: Montpellier leads by 55 points.
Nightlife. Montpellier 56, Tamarindo 45: Montpellier leads by 11 points.
Nature & outdoors. Montpellier 72, Tamarindo 76: Tamarindo leads by 4 points.
Day trips. Montpellier 85, Tamarindo 28: Montpellier leads by 57 points.
Good for families. Montpellier 62, Tamarindo 55: Montpellier leads by 7 points.
Getting around. Montpellier 74, Tamarindo 32: Montpellier leads by 42 points.
Shopping & style. Montpellier 47, Tamarindo 18: Montpellier leads by 29 points.
Affordability. Montpellier 50, Tamarindo 36: Montpellier leads by 14 points.
Live music & performing arts. Montpellier 63, Tamarindo 10: Montpellier leads by 53 points.
Wellness & relaxation. Montpellier 42, Tamarindo 45: Tamarindo leads by 3 points.
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What lies behind each score is written up on the two cities’ own pages: Montpellier and Tamarindo.

Your match

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

Montpellier
Best match
62match

Wins on day trips and culture and sights with your weighting.

Tamarindo
39match

Wins on beaches 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

Tamarindo in July

33 °Cdaytime high
23 °Cnight-time low
129 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

0100200300400JFMAMJJASOND
MontpellierTamarindo

Where the figures come from

Tamarindo's temperatures are measured 54 km from the centre, at Liberia.

Tamarindo 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). Tamarindo: 1991-2020 normals, Liberia (53.8 km from centre).

Before you go

MeasureMontpellierTamarindo
Official languageFrenchSpanish
CurrencyEuro (EUR)Costa Rican Colon (CRC)
SocketsCE230 V, 50 HzAB120 V, 60 Hz
Driving sideRightRight
Time zoneUTC+1, UTC+2 in summerUTC-6
Emergency number112911
Elevation7 m27 m
Main airportMontpellier-Méditerranée Airport (MPL)8 km from centre41 non-stop destinationsDaniel Oduber Quirós International Airport (LIR)43 km from centre30 non-stop destinations
Public holidays this year11 days11 days

By the numbers

MeasureMontpellierTamarindo
City population310,2407,132
People per km²5,45257
Museums within 10 km140
UNESCO World Heritage sites within 50 km20
Swim season, months above 21 °C2 months12 months

Where else could you go?

Every comparison below shares a destination with this one, so you can follow Montpellier or Tamarindo 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 2026-11-02. Daily budgets are estimates from country price levels.