VacationSelector
The Sultan Qaboos Grand Mosque, Muscat
MuscatThe Sultan Qaboos Grand Mosque
The Sanctuary of Truth by the sea, Pattaya
PattayaThe Sanctuary of Truth by the sea

Photos: Muscat by Alli Khalil, CC BY 4.0, cropped; Pattaya by Matrix, Pexels License.

Muscat or Pattaya?

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 Muscat for

  • nature and the outdoors
  • culture and sights
  • day trips

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

Choose Pattaya for

  • nightlife
  • prices
  • getting around

What lies behind each score is written up on Pattaya’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. Muscat 72, Pattaya 66: Muscat leads by 6 points.
Food & drink. Muscat 44, Pattaya 58: Pattaya leads by 14 points.
Culture & sights. Muscat 55, Pattaya 30: Muscat leads by 25 points.
Nightlife. Muscat 14, Pattaya 76: Pattaya leads by 62 points.
Nature & outdoors. Muscat 70, Pattaya 40: Muscat leads by 30 points.
Day trips. Muscat 62, Pattaya 52: Muscat leads by 10 points.
Good for families. Muscat 52, Pattaya 55: Pattaya leads by 3 points.
Getting around. Muscat 20, Pattaya 36: Pattaya leads by 16 points.
Shopping & style. Muscat and Pattaya are level on 42.
Affordability. Muscat 45, Pattaya 84: Pattaya leads by 39 points.
Live music & performing arts. Muscat 40, Pattaya 30: Muscat leads by 10 points.
Wellness & relaxation. Muscat 55, Pattaya 58: Pattaya leads by 3 points.
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What lies behind each score is written up on the two cities’ own pages: Muscat and Pattaya.

Your match

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

Muscat
48match

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

Pattaya
Best match
52match

Wins on nightlife and prices with your weighting.

What matters to you?

When should you go?

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

Muscat in July

33 °Cdaytime high
30 °Cnight-time low
0 mmrain in the month
9 hsunshine a day
31 °Csea
13 hdaylight a day

Pattaya in July

32 °Cdaytime high
26 °Cnight-time low
102 mmrain in the month
6 hsunshine a day
30 °Csea
13 hdaylight a day

Daytime high, °C

0°10°20°30°40°JFMAMJJASOND

Rainfall in the month, mm

0100200300JFMAMJJASOND
MuscatPattaya

Where the figures come from

Muscat's sunshine is measured 32 km from the centre, at Seeb, International Airport.

Pattaya's temperatures are measured 31 km from the centre, at Sattahip.

Pattaya 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.

Pattaya's sunshine is measured 86 km from the centre, at Bangna Agromet / Ban Khlong Samrong.

Temperature and rainfall are climate normals, averaged over the years shown. Muscat: 1991-2020 normals, Qaboos Port (3.4 km from centre). Pattaya: 1971-2000 (sunshine 1961-1990, rainfall 1991-2020) normals, Sattahip (31.2 km from centre).

Before you go

MeasureMuscatPattaya
Official languageArabicThai
CurrencyRial Omani (OMR)Baht (THB)
SocketsCG240 V, 50 HzABCF220 V, 50 Hz
Driving sideRightLeft
Time zoneUTC+4UTC+7
Emergency number968Police 191, ambulance 1669, fire 199
Elevation69 m35 m
Main airportMuscat International Airport (MCT)31 km from centre83 non-stop destinationsSuvarnabhumi Airport (BKK)83 km from centre150 non-stop destinations

By the numbers

MeasureMuscatPattaya
City population1,421,409119,532
People per km²406-
Museums within 10 km100
UNESCO World Heritage sites within 50 km00
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 Muscat or Pattaya 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). 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. Ground elevations sampled from the Mapzen terrain tiles via OpenTopoData, merging SRTM, ASTER, NED, EU-DEM and national sources. 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 2026-11-02. Daily budgets are estimates from country price levels.