VacationSelector
Seven Mile Beach, Negril
NegrilSeven Mile Beach
The beach and the bay with the mountains behind, Nuevo Vallarta
Nuevo VallartaThe beach and the bay with the mountains behind

Photos: Negril by gustavo.kunst, CC BY-SA 3.0, cropped; Nuevo Vallarta by Harpqueen, Public domain.

Negril or Nuevo Vallarta?

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 Negril for

  • nightlife
  • live music and the arts
  • beaches

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

Choose Nuevo Vallarta for

  • families
  • day trips
  • nature and the outdoors

What lies behind each score is written up on Nuevo Vallarta’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. Negril 93, Nuevo Vallarta 84: Negril leads by 9 points.
Food & drink. Negril 36, Nuevo Vallarta 40: Nuevo Vallarta leads by 4 points.
Culture & sights. Negril 8, Nuevo Vallarta 6: Negril leads by 2 points.
Nightlife. Negril 40, Nuevo Vallarta 16: Negril leads by 24 points.
Nature & outdoors. Negril 60, Nuevo Vallarta 75: Nuevo Vallarta leads by 15 points.
Day trips. Negril 35, Nuevo Vallarta 58: Nuevo Vallarta leads by 23 points.
Good for families. Negril 45, Nuevo Vallarta 73: Nuevo Vallarta leads by 28 points.
Getting around. Negril 30, Nuevo Vallarta 25: Negril leads by 5 points.
Shopping & style. Negril 15, Nuevo Vallarta 22: Nuevo Vallarta leads by 7 points.
Affordability. Negril 44, Nuevo Vallarta 45: Nuevo Vallarta leads by 1 points.
Live music & performing arts. Negril 33, Nuevo Vallarta 18: Negril leads by 15 points.
Wellness & relaxation. Negril 52, Nuevo Vallarta 55: Nuevo Vallarta leads by 3 points.
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What lies behind each score is written up on the two cities’ own pages: Negril and Nuevo Vallarta.

Your match

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

Too close to call, 2 points apart

Negril
41match

Wins on nightlife and live music and the arts with your weighting.

Nuevo Vallarta
43match

Wins on families and day trips with your weighting.

What matters to you?

When should you go?

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

Negril in July

34 °Cdaytime high
25 °Cnight-time low
174 mmrain in the month
9 hsunshine a day
29 °Csea
13 hdaylight a day

Nuevo Vallarta in July

34 °Cdaytime high
24 °Cnight-time low
206 mmrain in the month
No recordsunshine a day
30 °Csea
13 hdaylight a day

Daytime high, °C

0°10°20°30°40°JFMAMJJASOND

Rainfall in the month, mm

0100200300JFMAMJJASOND
NegrilNuevo Vallarta

Where the figures come from

Negril's temperatures are measured 52 km from the centre, at Montego Bay / Sangster.

Negril 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.

Nuevo Vallarta 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. Negril: 1991-2020 normals, Montego Bay / Sangster (51.8 km from centre). Nuevo Vallarta: 1991-2020 normals, TerraClimate 4 km grid at the town, no weather station within 90 km.

Before you go

MeasureNegrilNuevo Vallarta
Official languageEnglish, Jamaican PatoisSpanish, Nahuatl, Yucatec Maya
CurrencyJamaican Dollar (JMD)Mexican Peso (MXN)
SocketsAB116 V, 50 HzAB127 V, 60 Hz
Driving sideLeftRight
Time zoneUTC-5UTC-6
Emergency numberPolice 110/112/119/911, ambulance 110, fire 110911
Elevation10 m3 m
Main airportSangster International Airport (MBJ)52 km from centre48 non-stop destinationsPuerto Vallarta International Airport (PVR)4 km from centre52 non-stop destinations
Public holidays this year10 days9 days

By the numbers

MeasureNegrilNuevo Vallarta
City population4,5001,301
Museums within 10 km00
UNESCO World Heritage sites within 50 km01
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 Negril or Nuevo Vallarta 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). 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. Ground elevations sampled from the Mapzen terrain tiles via OpenTopoData, merging SRTM, ASTER, NED, EU-DEM and national sources. Temperature and rainfall for destinations with no weather station are from the NASA POWER 2001-2020 climatology, derived from MERRA-2. 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.