VacationSelector
Brooklyn Bridge and Lower Manhattan, New York
New YorkBrooklyn Bridge and Lower Manhattan
The Treasury, Al-Khazneh, cut into the rock, Petra
PetraThe Treasury, Al-Khazneh, cut into the rock

Photos: New York by Jakub Hałun, CC BY 4.0, cropped; Petra by Yasir Gürbüz, Pexels License.

New York or Petra?

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 York for

  • nightlife
  • live music and the arts
  • shopping

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

Choose Petra for

  • prices
  • nature and the outdoors

What lies behind each score is written up on Petra’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 York 50, Petra 5: New York leads by 45 points.
Food & drink. New York 92, Petra 22: New York leads by 70 points.
Culture & sights. New York 89, Petra 85: New York leads by 4 points.
Nightlife. New York 97, Petra 5: New York leads by 92 points.
Nature & outdoors. New York 55, Petra 78: Petra leads by 23 points.
Day trips. New York 68, Petra 30: New York leads by 38 points.
Good for families. New York 70, Petra 25: New York leads by 45 points.
Getting around. New York 82, Petra 25: New York leads by 57 points.
Shopping & style. New York 97, Petra 18: New York leads by 79 points.
Affordability. New York 12, Petra 45: Petra leads by 33 points.
Live music & performing arts. New York 99, Petra 10: New York leads by 89 points.
Wellness & relaxation. New York 42, Petra 28: New York leads by 14 points.
0255075100

What lies behind each score is written up on the two cities’ own pages: New York and Petra.

Your match

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

New York
Best match
71match

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

Petra
31match

Wins on prices and nature and the outdoors with your weighting.

What matters to you?

When should you go?

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

New York in July

30 °Cdaytime high
22 °Cnight-time low
107 mmrain in the month
No recordsunshine a day
22 °Csea
15 hdaylight a day

Petra in July

35 °Cdaytime high
19 °Cnight-time low
0 mmrain in the month
12 hsunshine a day
No seasea
14 hdaylight a day

Daytime high, °C

0°10°20°30°40°JFMAMJJASOND

Rainfall in the month, mm

0255075100125JFMAMJJASOND
New YorkPetra

Where the figures come from

Petra's temperatures are measured 34 km from the centre, at Ma'An.

Petra's station stands 219 m above the city centre, so the centre is likely a little warmer than the figures say.

Petra 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 York: 1991-2020 normals, LaGuardia Airport (12.9 km from centre). Petra: 1991-2020 normals, Ma'An (33.9 km from centre).

Before you go

MeasureNew YorkPetra
Official language-Arabic
CurrencyUS Dollar (USD)Jordanian Dinar (JOD)
SocketsAB120 V, 60 HzBCFGJ230 V, 50 Hz
Driving sideRightRight
Time zoneUTC-5, UTC-4 in summerUTC+3
Emergency number911911
Elevation25 m850 m
Main airportJohn F. Kennedy International Airport (JFK)21 km from centre189 non-stop destinationsKing Hussein International Airport (AQJ)90 km from centre5 non-stop destinations
Public holidays this year13 days-

By the numbers

MeasureNew YorkPetra
City population8,804,190-
People per km²7,256-
Museums within 10 km1572
UNESCO World Heritage sites within 50 km21
Swim season, months above 21 °C3 months-

Where else could you go?

Every comparison below shares a destination with this one, so you can follow New York or Petra 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. 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.