VacationSelector
The beach and the bay with the mountains behind, Nuevo Vallarta
Nuevo VallartaThe beach and the bay with the mountains behind
The Metropolitan Cathedral of San Jose, San Jose, Costa Rica
San Jose, Costa RicaThe Metropolitan Cathedral of San Jose

Photos: Nuevo Vallarta by Harpqueen, Public domain; San Jose, Costa Rica by Bernard Gagnon, CC0.

Nuevo Vallarta or San Jose, Costa Rica?

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
  • families
  • wellness

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

Choose San Jose, Costa Rica for

  • culture and sights
  • nightlife
  • live music and the arts

What lies behind each score is written up on San Jose, Costa Rica’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, San Jose, Costa Rica 12: Nuevo Vallarta leads by 72 points.
Food & drink. Nuevo Vallarta 40, San Jose, Costa Rica 42: San Jose, Costa Rica leads by 2 points.
Culture & sights. Nuevo Vallarta 6, San Jose, Costa Rica 38: San Jose, Costa Rica leads by 32 points.
Nightlife. Nuevo Vallarta 16, San Jose, Costa Rica 40: San Jose, Costa Rica leads by 24 points.
Nature & outdoors. Nuevo Vallarta 75, San Jose, Costa Rica 78: San Jose, Costa Rica leads by 3 points.
Day trips. Nuevo Vallarta 58, San Jose, Costa Rica 52: Nuevo Vallarta leads by 6 points.
Good for families. Nuevo Vallarta 73, San Jose, Costa Rica 44: Nuevo Vallarta leads by 29 points.
Getting around. Nuevo Vallarta 25, San Jose, Costa Rica 30: San Jose, Costa Rica leads by 5 points.
Shopping & style. Nuevo Vallarta 22, San Jose, Costa Rica 36: San Jose, Costa Rica leads by 14 points.
Affordability. Nuevo Vallarta 45, San Jose, Costa Rica 54: San Jose, Costa Rica leads by 9 points.
Live music & performing arts. Nuevo Vallarta 18, San Jose, Costa Rica 38: San Jose, Costa Rica leads by 20 points.
Wellness & relaxation. Nuevo Vallarta 55, San Jose, Costa Rica 28: Nuevo Vallarta leads by 27 points.
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What lies behind each score is written up on the two cities’ own pages: Nuevo Vallarta and San Jose, Costa Rica.

Your match

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

Too close to call, 2 points apart

Nuevo Vallarta
43match

Wins on beaches and families with your weighting.

San Jose, Costa Rica
41match

Wins on culture and sights 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.

Nuevo Vallarta in July

34 °Cdaytime high
24 °Cnight-time low
206 mmrain in the month
30 °Csea
13 hdaylight a day

San Jose, Costa Rica in July

28 °Cdaytime high
19 °Cnight-time low
173 mmrain in the month
No seasea
13 hdaylight a day

Daytime high, °C

0°10°20°30°40°JFMAMJJASOND

Rainfall in the month, mm

0100200300400JFMAMJJASOND
Nuevo VallartaSan Jose, Costa Rica

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.

San Jose, Costa Rica's station stands 241 m below the city centre, so the centre is likely a little cooler than the figures say.

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. San Jose, Costa Rica: 1991-2020 normals, Juan Santamaria (16.8 km from centre).

Before you go

MeasureNuevo VallartaSan Jose, Costa Rica
Official languageSpanish, Nahuatl, Yucatec MayaSpanish
CurrencyMexican Peso (MXN)Costa Rican Colon (CRC)
SocketsAB127 V, 60 HzAB120 V, 60 Hz
Driving sideRightRight
Time zoneUTC-6UTC-6
Emergency number911911
Elevation3 m1,161 m
Main airportPuerto Vallarta International Airport (PVR)4 km from centre52 non-stop destinationsJuan Santamaría International Airport (SJO)16 km from centre49 non-stop destinations
Public holidays this year9 days11 days

By the numbers

MeasureNuevo VallartaSan Jose, Costa Rica
City population1,301335,007
People per km²-7,511
Museums within 10 km09
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 San Jose, Costa Rica 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. 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.