VacationSelector
The white beach below the high-rise hotels, Orange Beach
Orange BeachThe white beach below the high-rise hotels
The Sanctuary of Truth by the sea, Pattaya
PattayaThe Sanctuary of Truth by the sea

Photos: Orange Beach by WeaponizingArchitecture, CC BY-SA 4.0, cropped; Pattaya by Matrix, Pexels License.

Orange Beach or Pattaya?

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

  • beaches
  • nature and the outdoors
  • families

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

Choose Pattaya for

  • nightlife
  • prices
  • wellness

What lies behind each score is written up on Pattaya’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, Pattaya 66: Orange Beach leads by 20 points.
Food & drink. Orange Beach 40, Pattaya 58: Pattaya leads by 18 points.
Culture & sights. Orange Beach 7, Pattaya 30: Pattaya leads by 23 points.
Nightlife. Orange Beach 30, Pattaya 76: Pattaya leads by 46 points.
Nature & outdoors. Orange Beach 60, Pattaya 40: Orange Beach leads by 20 points.
Day trips. Orange Beach 50, Pattaya 52: Pattaya leads by 2 points.
Good for families. Orange Beach 75, Pattaya 55: Orange Beach leads by 20 points.
Getting around. Orange Beach 15, Pattaya 36: Pattaya leads by 21 points.
Shopping & style. Orange Beach 25, Pattaya 42: Pattaya leads by 17 points.
Affordability. Orange Beach 38, Pattaya 84: Pattaya leads by 46 points.
Live music & performing arts. Orange Beach 32, Pattaya 30: Orange Beach leads by 2 points.
Wellness & relaxation. Orange Beach 32, Pattaya 58: Pattaya leads by 26 points.
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What lies behind each score is written up on the two cities’ own pages: Orange Beach and Pattaya.

Your match

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

Orange Beach
41match

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

Pattaya
Best match
52match

Wins on nightlife 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.

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

Pattaya in July

32 °Cdaytime high
26 °Cnight-time low
102 mmrain in the month
6 hsunshine a day
30 °Csea
13 hdaylight a day

Daytime high, °C

0°10°20°30°40°JFMAMJJASOND

Rainfall in the month, mm

0100200300JFMAMJJASOND
Orange BeachPattaya

Where the figures come from

Pattaya's temperatures are measured 31 km from the centre, at Sattahip.

Pattaya 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.

Pattaya's sunshine is measured 86 km from the centre, at Bangna Agromet / Ban Khlong Samrong.

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). Pattaya: 1971-2000 (sunshine 1961-1990, rainfall 1991-2020) normals, Sattahip (31.2 km from centre).

Before you go

MeasureOrange BeachPattaya
Official language-Thai
CurrencyUS Dollar (USD)Baht (THB)
SocketsAB120 V, 60 HzABCF220 V, 50 Hz
Driving sideRightLeft
Time zoneUTC-6, UTC-5 in summerUTC+7
Emergency number911Police 191, ambulance 1669, fire 199
Elevation4 m35 m
Main airportPensacola International Airport (PNS)41 km from centre27 non-stop destinationsSuvarnabhumi Airport (BKK)83 km from centre150 non-stop destinations
Public holidays this year13 days-

By the numbers

MeasureOrange BeachPattaya
City population8,095119,532
People per km²196-
Museums within 10 km00
UNESCO World Heritage sites within 50 km00
Swim season, months above 21 °C8 months12 months

Where else could you go?

Every comparison below shares a destination with this one, so you can follow Orange Beach or Pattaya 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. Ground elevations sampled from the Mapzen terrain tiles via OpenTopoData, merging SRTM, ASTER, NED, EU-DEM and national sources. 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.