VacationSelector
The white beach below the high-rise hotels, Orange Beach
Orange BeachThe white beach below the high-rise hotels
El Castillo above the beach at Tulum, Tulum
TulumEl Castillo above the beach at Tulum

Photos: Orange Beach by WeaponizingArchitecture, CC BY-SA 4.0, cropped; Tulum by Bjørn Christian Tørrissen, CC BY-SA 3.0, cropped.

Orange Beach or Tulum?

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

  • live music and the arts
  • families
  • prices

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

Choose Tulum for

  • wellness
  • nightlife
  • culture and sights

What lies behind each score is written up on Tulum’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, Tulum 88: Tulum leads by 2 points.
Food & drink. Orange Beach 40, Tulum 52: Tulum leads by 12 points.
Culture & sights. Orange Beach 7, Tulum 30: Tulum leads by 23 points.
Nightlife. Orange Beach 30, Tulum 60: Tulum leads by 30 points.
Nature & outdoors. Orange Beach 60, Tulum 76: Tulum leads by 16 points.
Day trips. Orange Beach 50, Tulum 68: Tulum leads by 18 points.
Good for families. Orange Beach 75, Tulum 60: Orange Beach leads by 15 points.
Getting around. Orange Beach 15, Tulum 25: Tulum leads by 10 points.
Shopping & style. Orange Beach 25, Tulum 35: Tulum leads by 10 points.
Affordability. Orange Beach 38, Tulum 30: Orange Beach leads by 8 points.
Live music & performing arts. Orange Beach 32, Tulum 15: Orange Beach leads by 17 points.
Wellness & relaxation. Orange Beach 32, Tulum 85: Tulum leads by 53 points.
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What lies behind each score is written up on the two cities’ own pages: Orange Beach and Tulum.

Your match

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

Orange Beach
41match

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

Tulum
Best match
52match

Wins on wellness 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.

Orange Beach in July

32 °Cdaytime high
24 °Cnight-time low
200 mmrain in the month
29 °Csea
14 hdaylight a day

Tulum in July

30 °Cdaytime high
26 °Cnight-time low
116 mmrain in the month
29 °Csea
13 hdaylight a day

Daytime high, °C

0°10°20°30°40°JFMAMJJASOND

Rainfall in the month, mm

050100150200250JFMAMJJASOND
Orange BeachTulum

Where the figures come from

Tulum 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. Orange Beach: 2006-2020 (rainfall 1991-2020) normals, Gulf Shores / Bay Village Mobile Home Park (10.5 km from centre). Tulum: 2001-2020 normals, NASA POWER reanalysis grid, no weather station within 90 km.

Before you go

MeasureOrange BeachTulum
Official language-Spanish, Nahuatl, Yucatec Maya
CurrencyUS Dollar (USD)Mexican Peso (MXN)
SocketsAB120 V, 60 HzAB127 V, 60 Hz
Driving sideRightRight
Time zoneUTC-6, UTC-5 in summerUTC-5
Emergency number911911
Elevation4 m5 m
Main airportPensacola International Airport (PNS)41 km from centre27 non-stop destinationsFelipe Carrillo Puerto International Airport Tulum (TQO)21 km from centre9 non-stop destinations
Public holidays this year13 days9 days

By the numbers

MeasureOrange BeachTulum
City population8,09533,374
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 Tulum 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. 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 2026-11-02. Daily budgets are estimates from country price levels.