VacationSelector
The Sultan Qaboos Grand Mosque, Muscat
MuscatThe Sultan Qaboos Grand Mosque
The town beach and the Portal Maya sculpture, Playa del Carmen
Playa del CarmenThe town beach and the Portal Maya sculpture

Photos: Muscat by Alli Khalil, CC BY 4.0, cropped; Playa del Carmen by lazyweaver, CC BY 3.0, cropped.

Muscat or Playa del Carmen?

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

  • culture and sights
  • live music and the arts
  • shopping

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

Choose Playa del Carmen for

  • nightlife
  • getting around
  • families

What lies behind each score is written up on Playa del Carmen’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, Playa del Carmen 88: Playa del Carmen leads by 16 points.
Food & drink. Muscat 44, Playa del Carmen 52: Playa del Carmen leads by 8 points.
Culture & sights. Muscat 55, Playa del Carmen 12: Muscat leads by 43 points.
Nightlife. Muscat 14, Playa del Carmen 66: Playa del Carmen leads by 52 points.
Nature & outdoors. Muscat 70, Playa del Carmen 74: Playa del Carmen leads by 4 points.
Day trips. Muscat 62, Playa del Carmen 72: Playa del Carmen leads by 10 points.
Good for families. Muscat 52, Playa del Carmen 78: Playa del Carmen leads by 26 points.
Getting around. Muscat 20, Playa del Carmen 55: Playa del Carmen leads by 35 points.
Shopping & style. Muscat 42, Playa del Carmen 38: Muscat leads by 4 points.
Affordability. Muscat 45, Playa del Carmen 52: Playa del Carmen leads by 7 points.
Live music & performing arts. Muscat 40, Playa del Carmen 22: Muscat leads by 18 points.
Wellness & relaxation. Muscat 55, Playa del Carmen 54: Muscat leads by 1 points.
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What lies behind each score is written up on the two cities’ own pages: Muscat and Playa del Carmen.

Your match

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

Muscat
48match

Wins on culture and sights and live music and the arts with your weighting.

Playa del Carmen
Best match
55match

Wins on nightlife and getting around 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

Playa del Carmen in July

29 °Cdaytime high
27 °Cnight-time low
96 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

050100150200250JFMAMJJASOND
MuscatPlaya del Carmen

Where the figures come from

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

Playa del Carmen has no weather station within reach, so its figures come from a gridded climate model rather than a measured record, and read a broad area rather than the city itself.

Temperature and rainfall are climate normals, averaged over the years shown. Muscat: 1991-2020 normals, Qaboos Port (3.4 km from centre). Playa del Carmen: 2001-2020 normals, NASA POWER reanalysis grid, no weather station within 90 km.

Before you go

MeasureMuscatPlaya del Carmen
Official languageArabicSpanish, Nahuatl, Yucatec Maya
CurrencyRial Omani (OMR)Mexican Peso (MXN)
SocketsCG240 V, 50 HzAB127 V, 60 Hz
Driving sideRightRight
Time zoneUTC+4UTC-5
Emergency number968911
Elevation69 m8 m
Main airportMuscat International Airport (MCT)31 km from centre83 non-stop destinationsCancún International Airport (CUN)50 km from centre137 non-stop destinations
Public holidays this year-9 days

By the numbers

MeasureMuscatPlaya del Carmen
City population1,421,409304,942
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 Playa del Carmen 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. Temperature and rainfall for destinations with no weather station are from the NASA POWER 2001-2020 climatology, derived from MERRA-2. Public holidays from Nager.Date (MIT). 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 2026-10-31. Daily budgets are estimates from country price levels.