VacationSelector
The beach and the bay with the mountains behind, Nuevo Vallarta
Nuevo VallartaThe beach and the bay with the mountains behind
The coloured houses stepping down to the sea, Positano
PositanoThe coloured houses stepping down to the sea

Photos: Nuevo Vallarta by Harpqueen, Public domain; Positano by Bernard Gagnon, CC BY 4.0, cropped.

Nuevo Vallarta or Positano?

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 Nuevo Vallarta for

  • families
  • prices
  • wellness

What lies behind each score is written up on Nuevo Vallarta’s own page.

Choose Positano for

  • day trips
  • shopping
  • culture and sights

What lies behind each score is written up on Positano’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. Nuevo Vallarta 84, Positano 77: Nuevo Vallarta leads by 7 points.
Food & drink. Nuevo Vallarta and Positano are level on 40.
Culture & sights. Nuevo Vallarta 6, Positano 22: Positano leads by 16 points.
Nightlife. Nuevo Vallarta 16, Positano 22: Positano leads by 6 points.
Nature & outdoors. Nuevo Vallarta 75, Positano 80: Positano leads by 5 points.
Day trips. Nuevo Vallarta 58, Positano 88: Positano leads by 30 points.
Good for families. Nuevo Vallarta 73, Positano 28: Nuevo Vallarta leads by 45 points.
Getting around. Nuevo Vallarta 25, Positano 35: Positano leads by 10 points.
Shopping & style. Nuevo Vallarta 22, Positano 45: Positano leads by 23 points.
Affordability. Nuevo Vallarta 45, Positano 10: Nuevo Vallarta leads by 35 points.
Live music & performing arts. Nuevo Vallarta 18, Positano 15: Nuevo Vallarta leads by 3 points.
Wellness & relaxation. Nuevo Vallarta 55, Positano 45: Nuevo Vallarta leads by 10 points.
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What lies behind each score is written up on the two cities’ own pages: Nuevo Vallarta and Positano.

Your match

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

Too close to call, 1 point apart

Nuevo Vallarta
43match

Wins on families and prices with your weighting.

Positano
42match

Wins on day trips and shopping with your weighting.

What matters to you?

When should you go?

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

Nuevo Vallarta in July

34 °Cdaytime high
24 °Cnight-time low
206 mmrain in the month
No recordsunshine a day
30 °Csea
13 hdaylight a day

Positano in July

29 °Cdaytime high
24 °Cnight-time low
27 mmrain in the month
11 hsunshine a day
25 °Csea
15 hdaylight a day

Daytime high, °C

0°10°20°30°40°JFMAMJJASOND

Rainfall in the month, mm

0100200300JFMAMJJASOND
Nuevo VallartaPositano

Where the figures come from

Nuevo Vallarta has no weather station within reach, so its figures come from a gridded climate model rather than a measured record, and read a broad area rather than the city itself.

Positano's temperatures are measured 25 km from the centre, at Capri.

Positano 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.

Positano's sunshine is measured 59 km from the centre, at Grazzanise.

Temperature and rainfall are climate normals, averaged over the years shown. Nuevo Vallarta: 1991-2020 normals, TerraClimate 4 km grid at the town, no weather station within 90 km. Positano: 2005-2025 (sunshine 1991-2020, rainfall 1991-2020) normals, Capri (25.3 km from centre).

Before you go

MeasureNuevo VallartaPositano
Official languageSpanish, Nahuatl, Yucatec MayaItalian
CurrencyMexican Peso (MXN)Euro (EUR)
SocketsAB127 V, 60 HzCFL230 V, 50 Hz
Driving sideRightRight
Time zoneUTC-6UTC+1, UTC+2 in summer
Emergency number911112
Elevation3 m142 m
Main airportPuerto Vallarta International Airport (PVR)4 km from centre52 non-stop destinationsNaples International Airport (NAP)33 km from centre131 non-stop destinations
Public holidays this year9 days13 days

By the numbers

MeasureNuevo VallartaPositano
City population1,3013,729
People per km²-429
Museums within 10 km010
UNESCO World Heritage sites within 50 km15
Swim season, months above 21 °C12 months5 months

Where else could you go?

Every comparison below shares a destination with this one, so you can follow Nuevo Vallarta or Positano somewhere new.

Browse every destination

Sources

Ground elevations sampled from the Mapzen terrain tiles via OpenTopoData, merging SRTM, ASTER, NED, EU-DEM and national sources. Structured data from Wikidata (CC0). Temperature and rainfall for destinations with no weather station are from the NASA POWER 2001-2020 climatology, derived from MERRA-2. 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. Weather data by Meteostat. Meteorological data provided by NOAA, DWD and others. 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 2026-11-02. Daily budgets are estimates from country price levels.