VacationSelector
The white beach below the high-rise hotels, Orange Beach
Orange BeachThe white beach below the high-rise hotels
Palermo Cathedral, Palermo
PalermoPalermo Cathedral

Photos: Orange Beach by WeaponizingArchitecture, CC BY-SA 4.0, cropped; Palermo by Antonino Giangrasso, Pexels License.

Orange Beach or Palermo?

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 Orange Beach for

  • families
  • beaches
  • wellness

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

Choose Palermo for

  • culture and sights
  • food and drink
  • getting around

What lies behind each score is written up on Palermo’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. Orange Beach 86, Palermo 77: Orange Beach leads by 9 points.
Food & drink. Orange Beach 40, Palermo 81: Palermo leads by 41 points.
Culture & sights. Orange Beach 7, Palermo 80: Palermo leads by 73 points.
Nightlife. Orange Beach 30, Palermo 58: Palermo leads by 28 points.
Nature & outdoors. Orange Beach 60, Palermo 72: Palermo leads by 12 points.
Day trips. Orange Beach 50, Palermo 84: Palermo leads by 34 points.
Good for families. Orange Beach 75, Palermo 44: Orange Beach leads by 31 points.
Getting around. Orange Beach 15, Palermo 50: Palermo leads by 35 points.
Shopping & style. Orange Beach 25, Palermo 44: Palermo leads by 19 points.
Affordability. Orange Beach 38, Palermo 63: Palermo leads by 25 points.
Live music & performing arts. Orange Beach 32, Palermo 62: Palermo leads by 30 points.
Wellness & relaxation. Orange Beach 32, Palermo 30: Orange Beach leads by 2 points.
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What lies behind each score is written up on the two cities’ own pages: Orange Beach and Palermo.

Your match

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

Orange Beach
41match

Wins on families and beaches with your weighting.

Palermo
Best match
62match

Wins on culture and sights and food and drink with your weighting.

What matters to you?

When should you go?

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

Orange Beach in July

32 °Cdaytime high
24 °Cnight-time low
200 mmrain in the month
No recordsunshine a day
29 °Csea
14 hdaylight a day

Palermo in July

29 °Cdaytime high
23 °Cnight-time low
2 mmrain in the month
11 hsunshine a day
26 °Csea
15 hdaylight a day

Daytime high, °C

0°10°20°30°40°JFMAMJJASOND

Rainfall in the month, mm

050100150200250JFMAMJJASOND
Orange BeachPalermo

Where the figures come from

Palermo 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.

Palermo's sunshine is measured 67 km from the centre, at Ustica.

Temperature and rainfall are climate normals, averaged over the years shown. Orange Beach: 2006-2020 (rainfall 1991-2020) normals, Gulf Shores / Bay Village Mobile Home Park (10.5 km from centre). Palermo: 1991-2020 (sunshine 1961-1990) normals, Palermo / Punta Raisi (24.1 km from centre).

Before you go

MeasureOrange BeachPalermo
Official language-Italian
CurrencyUS Dollar (USD)Euro (EUR)
SocketsAB120 V, 60 HzCFL230 V, 50 Hz
Driving sideRightRight
Time zoneUTC-6, UTC-5 in summerUTC+1, UTC+2 in summer
Emergency number911112
Elevation4 m14 m
Main airportPensacola International Airport (PNS)41 km from centre27 non-stop destinationsFalcone–Borsellino Airport (PMO)25 km from centre106 non-stop destinations
Public holidays this year13 days13 days

By the numbers

MeasureOrange BeachPalermo
City population8,095630,167
People per km²1963,924
Museums within 10 km042
UNESCO World Heritage sites within 50 km01
Swim season, months above 21 °C8 months5 months

Where else could you go?

Every comparison below shares a destination with this one, so you can follow Orange Beach or Palermo 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. 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. 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.