New York or Tokyo?
Two destinations compared on nine measures of openly sourced data. Weight what matters to you and the verdict follows.
Your match
Too close to call, level with your weighting
Wins on beaches & swimming and sights concentration with your weighting.
Wins on value for money and nature & day trips 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 New York if you want the coast within reach of the city, sights packed close enough to walk between, and the widest spread of kitchens: the sea is 1km from the centre and there are 17 beaches nearby.
Choose Tokyo if you want a milder year, more museums, more places to drink, and day trips that take you well beyond the centre.
Scoreboard
Each measure scored 0 to 100. Open a row for the figures behind the score.
Beaches & swimming. New York leads by 43 points.43
| New York | Tokyo | |
|---|---|---|
| Score | 64 | 21 |
| Swim season months | 3 | 4 |
| Beaches 10 km | 17 | 1 |
| Coast distance | 1 km | 5 km |
| Water distance | 1 km | 5 km |
Places to eat. New York leads by 5 points.5
| New York | Tokyo | |
|---|---|---|
| Score | 95 | 90 |
| Restaurants within 2 km of centre | 6,032 | 6,936 |
| Effective number of cuisines within 2 km | 38 | 25 |
Museums & heritage. Tokyo leads by 6 points.6
| New York | Tokyo | |
|---|---|---|
| Score | 60 | 66 |
| Museums within 10 km | 119 | 302 |
| Museums within 2 km of centre | 31 | 52 |
| Share of museums within 2 km % | 26 | 17 |
| Unesco sites within 50 km | 2 | 1 |
Nightlife. Tokyo leads by 6 points.6
| New York | Tokyo | |
|---|---|---|
| Score | 89 | 95 |
| Drinking venues within 4 km | 4,159 | 6,895 |
| Drinking venues within 2 km of centre | 2,015 | 3,033 |
| Share of drinking venues within 2 km % | 48 | 44 |
| Nightclubs within 4 km | 192 | 58 |
Nature & day trips. Tokyo leads by 19 points.19
| New York | Tokyo | |
|---|---|---|
| Score | 39 | 58 |
| Protected land share 50 km % | 4 | — |
| Landscape blanket share 50 km % | 0 | 0 |
| Land share of disc % | 69 | 85 |
| Park area within 2 km | 134 hectares | 85 hectares |
Good for families. New York leads by 1 points.1
| New York | Tokyo | |
|---|---|---|
| Score | 72 | 71 |
| Tourist attractions within 2 km | 37 | 40 |
| Park area within 2 km | 134 hectares | 85 hectares |
| Theme parks within 30 km | 7 | 9 |
Sights concentration. New York leads by 14 points.14
| New York | Tokyo | |
|---|---|---|
| Score | 74 | 60 |
| Notable places within 2 km | 268 | 121 |
| Min wikipedia languages | 5 | 5 |
Value for money. Tokyo leads by 27 points.27
| New York | Tokyo | |
|---|---|---|
| Score | 43 | 70 |
| Price level global | 100 | 62.4 |
| Daily budget | — | — |
Year-round weather. Tokyo leads by 6 points.6
| New York | Tokyo | |
|---|---|---|
| Score | 58 | 64 |
| Monthly daytime high | 4.5 °C to 30.1 °C | 10 °C to 31.5 °C |
| Monthly rainfall | 74 mm to 112 mm | 57 mm to 237 mm |
| Dry months | 0 | 0 |
Where they differ
New York puts the sea 1km from its centre against 5km in Tokyo, with 17 beaches nearby against Tokyo's single one. It also has about twice as much park space near the centre, and about twice as many notable places within walking distance, so more of a visit can be done on foot.
Tokyo's strength is the reach beyond the city, with more trips out of the centre, and a warmer year: highs run 10-32°C, and the sea holds 21°C or more for four months.
Where they are alike
Both handle children about equally well: a similar number of attractions near the centre, and theme parks within reach on each side, 9 for Tokyo and 7 for New York.
They are close on eating out and on nights out. Each has a comparable number of restaurants near the centre, New York with the wider range of kitchens; Tokyo has more places to drink, New York more nightclubs. Neither has a month at 40mm of rain or less.
Which traveller are you?
A family that wants water within reach should take New York: the sea is 1km from the centre, there are 17 beaches nearby, and there is more park space close in.
Someone here for museums and long evenings should pick Tokyo: about three times as many museums as New York, and about twice as many places to drink, though New York has far more nightclubs.
A walker who wants sights and dinner without transport should choose New York: about twice as many notable places within walking distance of the centre, and a wider range of kitchens among a similar number of restaurants.
What the numbers don't tell you
No cost comparison is possible here: the dataset carries no daily budget figure for either city, so nothing tells you which trip is cheaper. The value ranking rests on a different measure and is not a price.
The sunshine figure is missing for New York, since no nearby station records it, so that side of the weather comparison is simply unmeasured. Warmth also hides rain: neither city has a month at 40mm or less, and Tokyo's mildest sea months coincide with its wettest, above 220mm in autumn. New York's beach advantage likewise applies to a short window, with the sea only reaching 23°C at its late-summer peak.
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. New York: 1991-2020 normals, LaGuardia Airport (12.9 km from centre). Tokyo: 1991-2020 normals, Tokyo (3.6 km from centre).
New York peaks from May to September, with June at 27°C and the sea reaching 21°C by early autumn; rainfall stays near 100mm throughout, so the warm months are not the dry ones.
Tokyo is better in spring, at 19-24°C in April and May, and again in winter, when December and January hold 10-12°C against New York's colder 5-6°C and are the driest months of its year at 57-60mm. Skip the autumn, the wettest stretch of its year.
Getting there
| Flying from | New York | Tokyo |
|---|---|---|
| SeoulICN, GMP | 13 h 45 m no fares JFK · 21 km | 2 h 10 m €124-187 NRT · 56 km |
| Los AngelesLAX, BUR, SNA, VNY | 5 h 20 m €314-354 1 stop JFK · 21 km | 11 h 0 m €789-943 HND · 18 km |
| ChicagoORD, MDW, DPA, PWK +1 | 2 h 5 m €236-237 LGA · 13 km | 12 h 35 m no fares HND · 18 km |
| DallasDFW, DAL, AFW | 3 h 20 m €201-385 LGA · 13 km | 12 h 55 m €966-988 1 stop HND · 18 km |
| Hong KongHKG | 15 h 55 m no fares JFK · 21 km | 4 h 10 m €255-268 NRT · 56 km |
| ParisCDG, ORY, BVA | 7 h 30 m €445-517 JFK · 21 km | 12 h 5 m €835-923 HND · 18 km |
| LondonLHR, LGW, STN, LTN +2 | 7 h 10 m €459-498 JFK · 21 km | 11 h 55 m €820-907 1 stop HND · 18 km |
| WashingtonIAD, DCA | 1 h 5 m €203-258 LGA · 13 km | 13 h 30 m no fares HND · 18 km |
| Mexico CityMEX, NLU, TLC | 4 h 40 m €374-446 1 stop JFK · 21 km | 13 h 55 m no fares NRT · 56 km |
| Tel Aviv YafoTLV | 11 h 25 m €622-836 1 stop JFK · 21 km | 11 h 30 m no fares NRT · 56 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 2026-08 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 | New York | Tokyo |
|---|---|---|
| Official language | – | Japanese |
| Currency | US Dollar (USD) | Yen (JPY) |
| Sockets | AB120 V, 60 Hz | AB100 V, 50 and 60 Hz depending on the region |
| Driving side | Right | Left |
| Time zone | UTC-5, UTC-4 in summer | UTC+9 |
| Emergency number | 911 | Police 110, fire 119 |
| Elevation | 25 m | 6 m |
| Main airport | John F. Kennedy International Airport (JFK)21 km from centre188 non-stop destinations | Tokyo Haneda International Airport (HND)18 km from centre97 non-stop destinations |
| Public holidays this year | 13 days | 16 days |
By the numbers
| Measure | New York | Tokyo |
|---|---|---|
| City population | 8,804,190 | 14,264,798 |
| People per km² | 7,256 | 6,501 |
| Museums within 10 km | 157 | 191 |
| UNESCO World Heritage sites within 50 km | 2 | 1 |
| Distinct cuisines in the centre | 132 | 125 |
| Swim season, months above 21 °C | 3 months | 4 months |
Where else could you go?
Every comparison below shares a destination with this one, so you can follow New York or Tokyo somewhere new.