VacationSelector
The beach and the bay with the mountains behind, Nuevo Vallarta
Nuevo VallartaThe beach and the bay with the mountains behind
Santa Claus Village in winter, Rovaniemi
RovaniemiSanta Claus Village in winter

Photos: Nuevo Vallarta by Harpqueen, Public domain; Rovaniemi by Moskenes, CC BY-SA 4.0, cropped.

Nuevo Vallarta or Rovaniemi?

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

  • beaches
  • day trips
  • prices

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

Choose Rovaniemi for

  • culture and sights
  • getting around
  • wellness

What lies behind each score is written up on Rovaniemi’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, Rovaniemi 10: Nuevo Vallarta leads by 74 points.
Food & drink. Nuevo Vallarta 40, Rovaniemi 25: Nuevo Vallarta leads by 15 points.
Culture & sights. Nuevo Vallarta 6, Rovaniemi 22: Rovaniemi leads by 16 points.
Nightlife. Nuevo Vallarta 16, Rovaniemi 15: Nuevo Vallarta leads by 1 points.
Nature & outdoors. Nuevo Vallarta 75, Rovaniemi 78: Rovaniemi leads by 3 points.
Day trips. Nuevo Vallarta 58, Rovaniemi 8: Nuevo Vallarta leads by 50 points.
Good for families. Nuevo Vallarta 73, Rovaniemi 72: Nuevo Vallarta leads by 1 points.
Getting around. Nuevo Vallarta 25, Rovaniemi 36: Rovaniemi leads by 11 points.
Shopping & style. Nuevo Vallarta 22, Rovaniemi 18: Nuevo Vallarta leads by 4 points.
Affordability. Nuevo Vallarta 45, Rovaniemi 18: Nuevo Vallarta leads by 27 points.
Live music & performing arts. Nuevo Vallarta 18, Rovaniemi 22: Rovaniemi leads by 4 points.
Wellness & relaxation. Nuevo Vallarta 55, Rovaniemi 60: Rovaniemi leads by 5 points.
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What lies behind each score is written up on the two cities’ own pages: Nuevo Vallarta and Rovaniemi.

Your match

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

Nuevo Vallarta
Best match
43match

Wins on beaches and day trips with your weighting.

Rovaniemi
32match

Wins on culture and sights and getting around 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
30 °Csea
13 hdaylight a day

Rovaniemi in July

21 °Cdaytime high
12 °Cnight-time low
78 mmrain in the month
No seasea
22 hdaylight a day

Daytime high, °C

-10°0°10°20°30°40°JFMAMJJASOND

Rainfall in the month, mm

0100200300JFMAMJJASOND
Nuevo VallartaRovaniemi

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.

Rovaniemi 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. Nuevo Vallarta: 1991-2020 normals, TerraClimate 4 km grid at the town, no weather station within 90 km. Rovaniemi: 2008-2020 (rainfall 1991-2020) normals, Rovaniemi Rautatieasema / Kuusela (0.6 km from centre).

Before you go

MeasureNuevo VallartaRovaniemi
Official languageSpanish, Nahuatl, Yucatec MayaFinnish, Swedish
CurrencyMexican Peso (MXN)Euro (EUR)
SocketsAB127 V, 60 HzCF230 V, 50 Hz
Driving sideRightRight
Time zoneUTC-6UTC+2, UTC+3 in summer
Emergency number911112
Elevation3 m88 m
Main airportPuerto Vallarta International Airport (PVR)4 km from centre52 non-stop destinationsRovaniemi Airport (RVN)8 km from centre44 non-stop destinations
Public holidays this year9 days15 days

By the numbers

MeasureNuevo VallartaRovaniemi
City population1,30165,329
People per km²-9
Museums within 10 km06
UNESCO World Heritage sites within 50 km10
Swim season, months above 21 °C12 months-

Where else could you go?

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