VacationSelector
Waterfront houses on Harbor Island in Newport Harbor, Newport Beach
Newport BeachWaterfront houses on Harbor Island in Newport Harbor
The Big Buddha on the hill above Phuket, Phuket
PhuketThe Big Buddha on the hill above Phuket

Photos: Newport Beach by Don Ramey Logan, CC BY-SA 4.0, cropped; Phuket by Mussi Katz, CC0.

Newport Beach or Phuket?

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 Newport Beach for

  • live music and the arts
  • day trips
  • shopping

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

Choose Phuket for

  • prices
  • nightlife
  • wellness

What lies behind each score is written up on Phuket’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. Newport Beach 70, Phuket 90: Phuket leads by 20 points.
Food & drink. Newport Beach 50, Phuket 66: Phuket leads by 16 points.
Culture & sights. Newport Beach 20, Phuket 35: Phuket leads by 15 points.
Nightlife. Newport Beach 33, Phuket 72: Phuket leads by 39 points.
Nature & outdoors. Newport Beach 66, Phuket 80: Phuket leads by 14 points.
Day trips. Newport Beach 70, Phuket 45: Newport Beach leads by 25 points.
Good for families. Newport Beach 80, Phuket 65: Newport Beach leads by 15 points.
Getting around. Newport Beach 20, Phuket 22: Phuket leads by 2 points.
Shopping & style. Newport Beach 62, Phuket 42: Newport Beach leads by 20 points.
Affordability. Newport Beach 15, Phuket 68: Phuket leads by 53 points.
Live music & performing arts. Newport Beach 46, Phuket 20: Newport Beach leads by 26 points.
Wellness & relaxation. Newport Beach 44, Phuket 82: Phuket leads by 38 points.
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What lies behind each score is written up on the two cities’ own pages: Newport Beach and Phuket.

Your match

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

Newport Beach
48match

Wins on live music and the arts and day trips with your weighting.

Phuket
Best match
57match

Wins on prices and nightlife with your weighting.

What matters to you?

When should you go?

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

Newport Beach in July

26 °Cdaytime high
19 °Cnight-time low
1 mmrain in the month
20 °Csea
14 hdaylight a day

Phuket in July

32 °Cdaytime high
24 °Cnight-time low
287 mmrain in the month
30 °Csea
13 hdaylight a day

Daytime high, °C

0°10°20°30°40°JFMAMJJASOND

Rainfall in the month, mm

0100200300400JFMAMJJASOND
Newport BeachPhuket

Where the figures come from

Phuket's temperatures are measured 27 km from the centre, at Phuket Airport.

Temperature and rainfall are climate normals, averaged over the years shown. Newport Beach: 1991-2020 (rainfall 1981-2010) normals, Santa Ana / Paularino (7.1 km from centre). Phuket: 1991-2020 (rainfall 1961-1990) normals, Phuket Airport (26.9 km from centre).

Before you go

MeasureNewport BeachPhuket
Official language-Thai
CurrencyUS Dollar (USD)Baht (THB)
SocketsAB120 V, 60 HzABCF220 V, 50 Hz
Driving sideRightLeft
Time zoneUTC-8, UTC-7 in summerUTC+7
Emergency number911Police 191, ambulance 1669, fire 199
Elevation3 m19 m
Main airportJohn Wayne Orange County International Airport (SNA)7 km from centre53 non-stop destinationsPhuket International Airport (HKT)27 km from centre85 non-stop destinations
Public holidays this year13 days-

By the numbers

MeasureNewport BeachPhuket
City population85,23977,610
People per km²6226,468
Museums within 10 km42
UNESCO World Heritage sites within 50 km00
Swim season, months above 21 °CNone12 months

Where else could you go?

Every comparison below shares a destination with this one, so you can follow Newport Beach or Phuket 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.