VacationSelector
Waterfront houses on Harbor Island in Newport Harbor, Newport Beach
Newport BeachWaterfront houses on Harbor Island in Newport Harbor
Ca' d'Zan, the Ringling mansion on Sarasota Bay, Sarasota
SarasotaCa' d'Zan, the Ringling mansion on Sarasota Bay

Photos: Newport Beach by Don Ramey Logan, CC BY-SA 4.0, cropped; Sarasota by Oleg Yunakov, CC BY-SA 4.0, cropped.

Newport Beach or Sarasota?

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

  • shopping
  • day trips
  • families

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

Choose Sarasota for

  • culture and sights
  • beaches
  • prices

What lies behind each score is written up on Sarasota’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, Sarasota 86: Sarasota leads by 16 points.
Food & drink. Newport Beach 50, Sarasota 44: Newport Beach leads by 6 points.
Culture & sights. Newport Beach 20, Sarasota 45: Sarasota leads by 25 points.
Nightlife. Newport Beach 33, Sarasota 28: Newport Beach leads by 5 points.
Nature & outdoors. Newport Beach 66, Sarasota 55: Newport Beach leads by 11 points.
Day trips. Newport Beach 70, Sarasota 50: Newport Beach leads by 20 points.
Good for families. Newport Beach 80, Sarasota 68: Newport Beach leads by 12 points.
Getting around. Newport Beach 20, Sarasota 28: Sarasota leads by 8 points.
Shopping & style. Newport Beach 62, Sarasota 40: Newport Beach leads by 22 points.
Affordability. Newport Beach 15, Sarasota 30: Sarasota leads by 15 points.
Live music & performing arts. Newport Beach 46, Sarasota 58: Sarasota leads by 12 points.
Wellness & relaxation. Newport Beach 44, Sarasota 45: Sarasota leads by 1 points.
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What lies behind each score is written up on the two cities’ own pages: Newport Beach and Sarasota.

Your match

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

Too close to call, level with your weighting

Newport Beach
48match

Wins on shopping and day trips with your weighting.

Sarasota
48match

Wins on culture and sights and beaches 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
No recordsunshine a day
20 °Csea
14 hdaylight a day

Sarasota in July

32 °Cdaytime high
25 °Cnight-time low
195 mmrain in the month
9 hsunshine a day
30 °Csea
14 hdaylight a day

Daytime high, °C

0°10°20°30°40°JFMAMJJASOND

Rainfall in the month, mm

050100150200250JFMAMJJASOND
Newport BeachSarasota

Where the figures come from

Sarasota 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.

Sarasota's sunshine is measured 70 km from the centre, at Tampa International 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). Sarasota: 2006-2020 (sunshine 1991-2020, rainfall 1991-2020) normals, Sarasota / Ballentine Manor (6.7 km from centre).

Before you go

MeasureNewport BeachSarasota
CurrencyUS Dollar (USD)US Dollar (USD)
SocketsAB120 V, 60 HzAB120 V, 60 Hz
Driving sideRightRight
Time zoneUTC-8, UTC-7 in summerUTC-5, UTC-4 in summer
Emergency number911911
Elevation3 m7 m
Main airportJohn Wayne Orange County International Airport (SNA)7 km from centre53 non-stop destinationsSarasota Bradenton International Airport (SRQ)7 km from centre70 non-stop destinations
Public holidays this year13 days11 days

By the numbers

MeasureNewport BeachSarasota
City population85,23954,842
People per km²622840
Museums within 10 km43
UNESCO World Heritage sites within 50 km00
Swim season, months above 21 °CNone8 months

Where else could you go?

Every comparison below shares a destination with this one, so you can follow Newport Beach or Sarasota 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 2026-11-02. Daily budgets are estimates from country price levels.