VacationSelector
The steamboat Natchez on the Mississippi, New Orleans
New OrleansThe steamboat Natchez on the Mississippi
The cathedral facade, Siena
SienaThe cathedral facade

Photos: New Orleans by Bernard Spragg, CC0; Siena by Raimond Spekking, CC BY-SA 4.0, cropped.

New Orleans or Siena?

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

  • nightlife
  • live music and the arts
  • food and drink

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

Choose Siena for

  • day trips
  • wellness
  • nature and the outdoors

What lies behind each score is written up on Siena’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 and Siena are level on 14.
Food & drink. New Orleans 84, Siena 62: New Orleans leads by 22 points.
Culture & sights. New Orleans 67, Siena 78: Siena leads by 11 points.
Nightlife. New Orleans 85, Siena 27: New Orleans leads by 58 points.
Nature & outdoors. New Orleans 42, Siena 65: Siena leads by 23 points.
Day trips. New Orleans 52, Siena 94: Siena leads by 42 points.
Good for families. New Orleans 55, Siena 38: New Orleans leads by 17 points.
Getting around. New Orleans 55, Siena 60: Siena leads by 5 points.
Shopping & style. New Orleans 54, Siena 35: New Orleans leads by 19 points.
Affordability. New Orleans 40, Siena 42: Siena leads by 2 points.
Live music & performing arts. New Orleans 80, Siena 36: New Orleans leads by 44 points.
Wellness & relaxation. New Orleans 25, Siena 55: Siena leads by 30 points.
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What lies behind each score is written up on the two cities’ own pages: New Orleans and Siena.

Your match

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

New Orleans
Best match
54match

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

Siena
51match

Wins on day trips 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
30 °Csea
14 hdaylight a day

Siena in July

31 °Cdaytime high
17 °Cnight-time low
27 mmrain in the month
No seasea
15 hdaylight a day

Daytime high, °C

0°10°20°30°40°JFMAMJJASOND

Rainfall in the month, mm

050100150200JFMAMJJASOND
New OrleansSiena

Where the figures come from

Siena's temperatures are measured 45 km from the centre, at Arezzo.

Siena 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). Siena: 2006-2017 (rainfall 1991-2020) normals, Arezzo (45 km from centre).

Before you go

MeasureNew OrleansSiena
Official language-Italian
CurrencyUS Dollar (USD)Euro (EUR)
SocketsAB120 V, 60 HzCFL230 V, 50 Hz
Driving sideRightRight
Time zoneUTC-6, UTC-5 in summerUTC+1, UTC+2 in summer
Emergency number911112
Elevation-2 m322 m
Main airportLouis Armstrong New Orleans International Airport (MSY)18 km from centre51 non-stop destinationsFlorence Airport, Peretola (FLR)55 km from centre46 non-stop destinations
Public holidays this year14 days13 days

By the numbers

MeasureNew OrleansSiena
City population383,99752,812
People per km²423446
Museums within 10 km1630
UNESCO World Heritage sites within 50 km05
Swim season, months above 21 °C7 months-

Where else could you go?

Every comparison below shares a destination with this one, so you can follow New Orleans or Siena 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. Tourism statistics from Eurostat, © European Union, reused under CC BY 4.0. 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.