VacationSelector
Santo Domingo church behind agaves, Oaxaca
OaxacaSanto Domingo church behind agaves
Rowing boats below the ghats in the morning light, Varanasi
VaranasiRowing boats below the ghats in the morning light

Photos: Oaxaca by Öskr Rck, CC BY-SA 3.0, cropped; Varanasi by Dennis G. Jarvis, CC BY-SA 2.0, cropped.

Oaxaca or Varanasi?

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 Oaxaca for

  • nature and the outdoors
  • families
  • nightlife

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

Choose Varanasi for

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

What lies behind each score is written up on Varanasi’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. Oaxaca 5, Varanasi 4: Oaxaca leads by 1 points.
Food & drink. Oaxaca 84, Varanasi 55: Oaxaca leads by 29 points.
Culture & sights. Oaxaca 74, Varanasi 80: Varanasi leads by 6 points.
Nightlife. Oaxaca 40, Varanasi 10: Oaxaca leads by 30 points.
Nature & outdoors. Oaxaca 62, Varanasi 18: Oaxaca leads by 44 points.
Day trips. Oaxaca 65, Varanasi 42: Oaxaca leads by 23 points.
Good for families. Oaxaca 40, Varanasi 5: Oaxaca leads by 35 points.
Getting around. Oaxaca 55, Varanasi 28: Oaxaca leads by 27 points.
Shopping & style. Oaxaca 62, Varanasi 55: Oaxaca leads by 7 points.
Affordability. Oaxaca 77, Varanasi 92: Varanasi leads by 15 points.
Live music & performing arts. Oaxaca 38, Varanasi 58: Varanasi leads by 20 points.
Wellness & relaxation. Oaxaca 50, Varanasi 30: Oaxaca leads by 20 points.
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What lies behind each score is written up on the two cities’ own pages: Oaxaca and Varanasi.

Your match

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

Oaxaca
Best match
54match

Wins on nature and the outdoors and families with your weighting.

Varanasi
40match

Wins on live music and the arts and prices with your weighting.

What matters to you?

When should you go?

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

Oaxaca in July

28 °Cdaytime high
15 °Cnight-time low
80 mmrain in the month
7 hsunshine a day
13 hdaylight a day

Varanasi in July

35 °Cdaytime high
27 °Cnight-time low
249 mmrain in the month
No recordsunshine a day
14 hdaylight a day

Daytime high, °C

0°10°20°30°40°50°JFMAMJJASOND

Rainfall in the month, mm

050100150200250JFMAMJJASOND
OaxacaVaranasi

Where the figures come from

Varanasi 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.

Temperature and rainfall are climate normals, averaged over the years shown. Oaxaca: 1961-1990 normals, Oaxaca, Oax. (1.1 km from centre). Varanasi: 2001-2020 normals, NASA POWER reanalysis grid, no weather station within 90 km.

Before you go

MeasureOaxacaVaranasi
Official languageSpanish, Nahuatl, Yucatec MayaHindi, English
CurrencyMexican Peso (MXN)Indian Rupee (INR)
SocketsAB127 V, 60 HzCM230 V, 50 Hz
Driving sideRightLeft
Time zoneUTC-6UTC+5:30
Emergency number911108 or 112
Elevation1,555 m76 m
Main airportXoxocotlán International Airport (OAX)7 km from centre14 non-stop destinationsLal Bahadur Shastri International Airport (VNS)21 km from centre16 non-stop destinations
Public holidays this year9 days-

By the numbers

MeasureOaxacaVaranasi
City population258,9131,198,491
People per km²3,02814,598
Museums within 10 km102
UNESCO World Heritage sites within 50 km21

Where else could you go?

Every comparison below shares a destination with this one, so you can follow Oaxaca or Varanasi 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. 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. Temperature and rainfall for destinations with no weather station are from the NASA POWER 2001-2020 climatology, derived from MERRA-2. 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 2026-10-31. Daily budgets are estimates from country price levels.