Naples or Zadar?
Two destinations compared on nine measures of openly sourced data. Weight what matters to you and the verdict follows.
Your match
Wins on sights concentration and museums & heritage with your weighting.
Wins on nature & day trips and value for money with your weighting.
What matters to you?
Pick a travel style or drag the sliders. The match scores above update as you do.
The verdict
Choose Naples if the trip is about the city itself: museums, notable places and late-night venues cluster within walking distance of the centre, and the sea is still only 1km away.
Choose Zadar if it is about water and open country: the sea starts at the centre, 49 beaches lie nearby, and more of the surrounding land is protected.
Scoreboard
Each measure scored 0 to 100. Open a row for the figures behind the score.
Beaches & swimming. Naples leads by 3 points.3
| Naples | Zadar | |
|---|---|---|
| Score | 76 | 73 |
| Swim season months | 5 | 4 |
| Beaches 10 km | 29 | 49 |
| Coast distance | 1 km | 0 km |
| Water distance | 1 km | 0 km |
Places to eat. Naples leads by 21 points.21
| Naples | Zadar | |
|---|---|---|
| Score | 46 | 25 |
| Restaurants within 2 km of centre | 1,244 | 143 |
| Effective number of cuisines within 2 km | 7 | 11 |
Museums & heritage. Naples leads by 45 points.45
| Naples | Zadar | |
|---|---|---|
| Score | 78 | 33 |
| Museums within 10 km | 84 | 8 |
| Museums within 2 km of centre | 68 | 8 |
| Share of museums within 2 km % | 81 | 100 |
| Unesco sites within 50 km | 5 | 2 |
Nightlife. Naples leads by 41 points.41
| Naples | Zadar | |
|---|---|---|
| Score | 66 | 25 |
| Drinking venues within 4 km | 1,389 | 194 |
| Drinking venues within 2 km of centre | 964 | 139 |
| Share of drinking venues within 2 km % | 69 | 72 |
| Nightclubs within 4 km | 40 | 4 |
Nature & day trips. Zadar leads by 18 points.18
| Naples | Zadar | |
|---|---|---|
| Score | 37 | 55 |
| Protected land share 50 km % | 7 | 12 |
| Landscape blanket share 50 km % | 0 | 0 |
| Land share of disc % | 56 | 47 |
| Park area within 2 km | 41 hectares | 30 hectares |
Good for families. Naples leads by 10 points.10
| Naples | Zadar | |
|---|---|---|
| Score | 41 | 31 |
| Tourist attractions within 2 km | 11 | 9 |
| Park area within 2 km | 41 hectares | 30 hectares |
| Theme parks within 30 km | 3 | 1 |
Sights concentration. Naples leads by 47 points.47
| Naples | Zadar | |
|---|---|---|
| Score | 78 | 31 |
| Notable places within 2 km | 351 | 23 |
| Min wikipedia languages | 5 | 5 |
Value for money. Zadar leads by 12 points.12
| Naples | Zadar | |
|---|---|---|
| Score | 68 | 80 |
| Price level global | 64.9 | 48.5 |
| Daily budget | €155 | €138 |
Year-round weather. Naples leads by 4 points.4
| Naples | Zadar | |
|---|---|---|
| Score | 73 | 69 |
| Monthly daytime high | 13.1 °C to 31.4 °C | 10.4 °C to 31 °C |
| Monthly rainfall | 17 mm to 159 mm | 25 mm to 117 mm |
| Dry months | 3 | 2 |
Where they differ
Naples has many times as many museums as Zadar, and 5 UNESCO-listed places within day-trip reach against Zadar's 2. Many times as many notable places sit within walking distance of the centre, so days fill up on foot, and its drinking venues and nightclubs outnumber Zadar's by a wide margin, most of them central.
Zadar is the better base for getting out of town: 12% of the land around it is protected against 7% around Naples. It has far fewer restaurants, but a wider range of kitchens.
Where they are alike
Both are swimming cities. The sea starts at Zadar's centre and 1km from Naples's, so a beach afternoon needs no planning in either, and both warm to 25-26°C in August.
The two also run close on weather and on what they lay on for families. Both peak at 31°C in high summer, both are at their coolest in January, and neither has a great deal built specifically for children.
Which traveller are you?
History-minded travellers should take Naples: many times as many museums as Zadar, 5 UNESCO-listed places within day-trip reach against 2, and enough notable places within walking distance of the centre to fill several days on foot.
Anyone planning walks, boat trips and time outdoors is better served by Zadar, where 12% of the surrounding land is protected, a larger share than around Naples, and the sea begins at the centre.
Families will find neither city built around them, but Naples has somewhat more attractions and park space near its centre, plus more theme parks within reach, and its sea stays swimmable a month longer.
What the numbers don't tell you
The daily budget figures, €155 for Italy and €138 for Croatia, are national price levels for restaurants and hotels rather than measurements of either city. A large, heavily visited city can sit further from its own country's average than these two figures sit from each other, so they do not tell you which trip will cost more.
No weather station near Zadar records sunshine hours, so that side of the weather comparison is missing rather than poor, and its monthly picture rests on temperature, rainfall and sea temperature alone. The warmest sea months are also the busiest: a long beach list is no promise of space in August.
When should you go?
The figures behind each month. Each row is shaded against that destination's own year, so the deepest cell is its best month for that measure and the palest its weakest. Shades are not comparable between the two rows.
Temperature and rainfall are thirty-year climate normals, averaged over the years shown. Naples: 1991-2020 normals, Grazzanise (28.3 km from centre). Zadar: 1999-2020 (rainfall 1991-2020) normals, Zadar / Zemunik (9.9 km from centre).
Naples is at its best from June to September. June brings highs of 28°C with 29mm of rain, and July and August are its driest months, at 17-18mm, with the sea at 25-26°C. November is the month to avoid, at 159mm.
Zadar rewards the shoulder months more evenly: May and September stand with midsummer there, at 23°C and 26°C, with the sea still 23°C in September. April is drier than Naples's, at 62mm. November is wettest, at 117mm.
Getting there
| Flying from | Naples | Zadar |
|---|---|---|
| MilanMXP, BGY, LIN | 1 h 30 m €35-109 NAP · 7 km | 1 h 20 m no fares ZAD · 10 km |
| ParisCDG, ORY, BVA | 2 h 10 m €108-170 NAP · 7 km | 2 h 5 m €169-225 SPU · 107 km |
| LondonLHR, LGW, STN, LTN +2 | 2 h 35 m €90-167 1 stop NAP · 7 km | 2 h 20 m no fares ZAD · 10 km |
| AmsterdamAMS | 2 h 25 m €163-210 1 stop NAP · 7 km | 2 h 10 m €186-201 1 stop SPU · 107 km |
| RomeFCO, CIA | 55 m no fares NAP · 7 km | 1 h 5 m €294 SPU · 107 km |
| MunichMUC | 1 h 40 m €157-224 1 stop NAP · 7 km | 1 h 25 m no fares SPU · 107 km |
| ViennaVIE | 1 h 40 m €125-207 1 stop NAP · 7 km | 1 h 10 m €45-192 ZAD · 10 km |
| DublinDUB | 3 h 5 m €109-195 NAP · 7 km | 3 h 0 m no fares SPU · 107 km |
| FrankfurtFRA, HHN | 2 h 0 m €132-252 1 stop NAP · 7 km | 1 h 40 m €161-226 1 stop ZAD · 10 km |
| New YorkJFK, EWR, LGA | 9 h 0 m no fares NAP · 7 km | 9 h 0 m no fares SPU · 107 km |
The busiest departure cities for these two, with a place kept for each other part of the world. Busiest means arriving passengers where an official count exists, and where none does, the number of non-stop services flown: official route statistics are published by the European reporting countries and by nobody else, so a table ranked on them alone would offer a reader in New York or Tokyo ten European cities. Flying times are estimated from the distance between airports, and every row is a city flown non-stop to both. Where the typical offer connects anyway, the stops are shown. Under each figure is the airport the flight lands at and how far that is from the centre, because the nearest airport is not always the one a route is flown to. Where both columns name the same airport it is one flight, and the difference between the two is the distance printed beside it. Typical return fares for 2026-09 to 2026-10, cached market data up to 7 days old. The figure is the middle half of the offers found, so a single price means they agreed and a range means they did not; for a typical route that middle half spans about a quarter of the median, and for the least settled routes rather more than the median itself.
Before you go
| Measure | Naples | Zadar |
|---|---|---|
| Official language | Italian | Croatian |
| Currency | Euro (EUR) | Euro (EUR) |
| Sockets | CFL230 V, 50 Hz | CF230 V, 50 Hz |
| Driving side | Right | Right |
| Time zone | UTC+1, UTC+2 in summer | UTC+1, UTC+2 in summer |
| Emergency number | 112 | 112 |
| Elevation | 17 m | 5 m |
| Main airport | Naples International Airport (NAP)7 km from centre131 non-stop destinations | Zadar Airport (ZAD)10 km from centre67 non-stop destinations |
| Public holidays this year | 13 days | 14 days |
By the numbers
| Measure | Naples | Zadar |
|---|---|---|
| City population | 913,462 | 70,779 |
| People per km² | 7,676 | – |
| Museums within 10 km | 65 | 1 |
| UNESCO World Heritage sites within 50 km | 5 | 2 |
| Distinct cuisines in the centre | 31 | 17 |
| Swim season, months above 21 °C | 5 months | 4 months |
Where else could you go?
Every comparison below shares a destination with this one, so you can follow Naples or Zadar somewhere new.