VacationSelector
The limestone terraces of Dunn's River Falls, Ocho Rios
Ocho RiosThe limestone terraces of Dunn's River Falls
The Metropolitan Cathedral of San Jose, San Jose, Costa Rica
San Jose, Costa RicaThe Metropolitan Cathedral of San Jose

Photos: Ocho Rios by Dr. Thomas Liptak, CC BY-SA 4.0, cropped; San Jose, Costa Rica by Bernard Gagnon, CC0.

Ocho Rios 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 Ocho Rios for

  • beaches
  • wellness
  • families

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

Choose San Jose, Costa Rica for

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

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. Ocho Rios 78, San Jose, Costa Rica 12: Ocho Rios leads by 66 points.
Food & drink. Ocho Rios and San Jose, Costa Rica are level on 42.
Culture & sights. Ocho Rios 16, San Jose, Costa Rica 38: San Jose, Costa Rica leads by 22 points.
Nightlife. Ocho Rios 28, San Jose, Costa Rica 40: San Jose, Costa Rica leads by 12 points.
Nature & outdoors. Ocho Rios 72, San Jose, Costa Rica 78: San Jose, Costa Rica leads by 6 points.
Day trips. Ocho Rios 56, San Jose, Costa Rica 52: Ocho Rios leads by 4 points.
Good for families. Ocho Rios 60, San Jose, Costa Rica 44: Ocho Rios leads by 16 points.
Getting around. Ocho Rios 24, San Jose, Costa Rica 30: San Jose, Costa Rica leads by 6 points.
Shopping & style. Ocho Rios 26, San Jose, Costa Rica 36: San Jose, Costa Rica leads by 10 points.
Affordability. Ocho Rios 42, San Jose, Costa Rica 54: San Jose, Costa Rica leads by 12 points.
Live music & performing arts. Ocho Rios 14, San Jose, Costa Rica 38: San Jose, Costa Rica leads by 24 points.
Wellness & relaxation. Ocho Rios 50, San Jose, Costa Rica 28: Ocho Rios leads by 22 points.
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What lies behind each score is written up on the two cities’ own pages: Ocho Rios 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, 1 point apart

Ocho Rios
42match

Wins on beaches and wellness with your weighting.

San Jose, Costa Rica
41match

Wins on live music and the arts and culture and sights with your weighting.

What matters to you?

When should you go?

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

Ocho Rios in July

33 °Cdaytime high
26 °Cnight-time low
85 mmrain in the month
8 hsunshine a day
29 °Csea
13 hdaylight a day

San Jose, Costa Rica in July

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

Daytime high, °C

0°10°20°30°40°JFMAMJJASOND

Rainfall in the month, mm

0100200300400JFMAMJJASOND
Ocho RiosSan Jose, Costa Rica

Where the figures come from

Ocho Rios's temperatures are measured 62 km from the centre, at Kingston / Norman Manley.

Ocho Rios 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.

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. Ocho Rios: 1991-2020 normals, Kingston / Norman Manley (61.9 km from centre). San Jose, Costa Rica: 1991-2020 normals, Juan Santamaria (16.8 km from centre).

Before you go

MeasureOcho RiosSan Jose, Costa Rica
Official languageEnglish, Jamaican PatoisSpanish
CurrencyJamaican Dollar (JMD)Costa Rican Colon (CRC)
SocketsAB116 V, 50 HzAB120 V, 60 Hz
Driving sideLeftRight
Time zoneUTC-5UTC-6
Emergency numberPolice 110/112/119/911, ambulance 110, fire 110911
Elevation59 m1,161 m
Main airportSangster International Airport (MBJ)86 km from centre48 non-stop destinationsJuan Santamaría International Airport (SJO)16 km from centre49 non-stop destinations
Public holidays this year10 days11 days

By the numbers

MeasureOcho RiosSan Jose, Costa Rica
City population16,671335,007
People per km²-7,511
Museums within 10 km09
UNESCO World Heritage sites within 50 km00
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 Ocho Rios 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). 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). 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. Exchange rates via Frankfurter, based on European Central Bank reference rates.

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.