VacationSelector
The steamboat Natchez on the Mississippi, New Orleans
New OrleansThe steamboat Natchez on the Mississippi
Fishermen on the rocks at Playa Santa Teresa at sunset, Santa Teresa, Costa Rica
Santa Teresa, Costa RicaFishermen on the rocks at Playa Santa Teresa at sunset

Photos: New Orleans by Bernard Spragg, CC0; Santa Teresa, Costa Rica by Christopher Crouzet, CC BY-SA 4.0, cropped.

New Orleans or Santa Teresa, Costa Rica?

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 New Orleans for

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

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

Choose Santa Teresa, Costa Rica for

  • beaches
  • wellness
  • nature and the outdoors

What lies behind each score is written up on Santa Teresa, Costa Rica’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. New Orleans 14, Santa Teresa, Costa Rica 84: Santa Teresa, Costa Rica leads by 70 points.
Food & drink. New Orleans 84, Santa Teresa, Costa Rica 40: New Orleans leads by 44 points.
Culture & sights. New Orleans 67, Santa Teresa, Costa Rica 4: New Orleans leads by 63 points.
Nightlife. New Orleans 85, Santa Teresa, Costa Rica 30: New Orleans leads by 55 points.
Nature & outdoors. New Orleans 42, Santa Teresa, Costa Rica 78: Santa Teresa, Costa Rica leads by 36 points.
Day trips. New Orleans 52, Santa Teresa, Costa Rica 12: New Orleans leads by 40 points.
Good for families. New Orleans 55, Santa Teresa, Costa Rica 35: New Orleans leads by 20 points.
Getting around. New Orleans 55, Santa Teresa, Costa Rica 15: New Orleans leads by 40 points.
Shopping & style. New Orleans 54, Santa Teresa, Costa Rica 12: New Orleans leads by 42 points.
Affordability. New Orleans 40, Santa Teresa, Costa Rica 25: New Orleans leads by 15 points.
Live music & performing arts. New Orleans 80, Santa Teresa, Costa Rica 8: New Orleans leads by 72 points.
Wellness & relaxation. New Orleans 25, Santa Teresa, Costa Rica 70: Santa Teresa, Costa Rica leads by 45 points.
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What lies behind each score is written up on the two cities’ own pages: New Orleans and Santa Teresa, Costa Rica.

Your match

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

New Orleans
Best match
54match

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

Santa Teresa, Costa Rica
34match

Wins on beaches and wellness with your weighting.

What matters to you?

When should you go?

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

New Orleans in July

33 °Cdaytime high
24 °Cnight-time low
169 mmrain in the month
No recordsunshine a day
30 °Csea
14 hdaylight a day

Santa Teresa, Costa Rica in July

33 °Cdaytime high
23 °Cnight-time low
218 mmrain in the month
5 hsunshine a day
29 °Csea
13 hdaylight a day

Daytime high, °C

0°10°20°30°40°JFMAMJJASOND

Rainfall in the month, mm

0100200300400500JFMAMJJASOND
New OrleansSanta Teresa, Costa Rica

Where the figures come from

Santa Teresa, Costa Rica's temperatures are measured 52 km from the centre, at Puntarenas.

Santa Teresa, Costa Rica 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. New Orleans: 1991-2020 normals, New Orleans Airport (2.7 km from centre). Santa Teresa, Costa Rica: 1961-1990 (rainfall 1991-2020) normals, Puntarenas (51.5 km from centre).

Before you go

MeasureNew OrleansSanta Teresa, Costa Rica
Official language-Spanish
CurrencyUS Dollar (USD)Costa Rican Colon (CRC)
SocketsAB120 V, 60 HzAB120 V, 60 Hz
Driving sideRightRight
Time zoneUTC-6, UTC-5 in summerUTC-6
Emergency number911911
Elevation-2 m19 m
Main airportLouis Armstrong New Orleans International Airport (MSY)18 km from centre51 non-stop destinationsDaniel Oduber Quirós International Airport (LIR)113 km from centre30 non-stop destinations
Public holidays this year14 days11 days

By the numbers

MeasureNew OrleansSanta Teresa, Costa Rica
City population383,997-
People per km²423-
Museums within 10 km160
UNESCO World Heritage sites within 50 km00
Swim season, months above 21 °C7 months12 months

Where else could you go?

Every comparison below shares a destination with this one, so you can follow New Orleans or Santa Teresa, Costa Rica 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). Exchange rates via Frankfurter, based on European Central Bank reference rates. 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. 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.