VacationSelector
Parliament Hill across the Ottawa River, Ottawa
OttawaParliament Hill across the Ottawa River
A cobbled street of painted houses in Old San Juan, San Juan
San JuanA cobbled street of painted houses in Old San Juan

Photos: Ottawa by Dennis G. Jarvis, CC BY-SA 2.0, cropped; San Juan by Mohan Nannapaneni, Pexels License.

Ottawa or San Juan?

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 Ottawa for

  • getting around
  • wellness
  • families

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

Choose San Juan for

  • beaches
  • nightlife
  • food and drink

What lies behind each score is written up on San Juan’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. Ottawa 35, San Juan 84: San Juan leads by 49 points.
Food & drink. Ottawa 45, San Juan 66: San Juan leads by 21 points.
Culture & sights. Ottawa 62, San Juan 64: San Juan leads by 2 points.
Nightlife. Ottawa 35, San Juan 70: San Juan leads by 35 points.
Nature & outdoors. Ottawa 68, San Juan 74: San Juan leads by 6 points.
Day trips. Ottawa 55, San Juan 52: Ottawa leads by 3 points.
Good for families. Ottawa 68, San Juan 58: Ottawa leads by 10 points.
Getting around. Ottawa 62, San Juan 38: Ottawa leads by 24 points.
Shopping & style. Ottawa 40, San Juan 50: San Juan leads by 10 points.
Affordability. Ottawa 40, San Juan 38: Ottawa leads by 2 points.
Live music & performing arts. Ottawa 52, San Juan 55: San Juan leads by 3 points.
Wellness & relaxation. Ottawa 55, San Juan 40: Ottawa leads by 15 points.
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What lies behind each score is written up on the two cities’ own pages: Ottawa and San Juan.

Your match

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

Ottawa
51match

Wins on getting around and wellness with your weighting.

San Juan
Best match
57match

Wins on beaches 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.

Ottawa in July

27 °Cdaytime high
16 °Cnight-time low
82 mmrain in the month
No recordsunshine a day
No seasea
15 hdaylight a day

San Juan in July

32 °Cdaytime high
25 °Cnight-time low
153 mmrain in the month
9 hsunshine a day
28 °Csea
13 hdaylight a day

Daytime high, °C

-10°0°10°20°30°40°JFMAMJJASOND

Rainfall in the month, mm

050100150200JFMAMJJASOND
OttawaSan Juan

Temperature and rainfall are climate normals, averaged over the years shown. Ottawa: 1991-2020 normals, Ottawa CDA RCS (5.3 km from centre). San Juan: 1991-2020 normals, San Juan / Int., Puerto Rico (12.8 km from centre).

Before you go

MeasureOttawaSan Juan
Official languageFrench, EnglishSpanish, English
CurrencyCanadian Dollar (CAD)US Dollar (USD)
SocketsAB120 V, 60 HzAB120 V, 60 Hz
Driving sideRightRight
Time zoneUTC-5, UTC-4 in summerUTC-4
Emergency number911911
Elevation70 m3 m
Main airportOttawa Macdonald-Cartier International Airport (YOW)12 km from centre46 non-stop destinationsLuis Munoz Marin International Airport (SJU)12 km from centre59 non-stop destinations
Public holidays this year11 days21 days

By the numbers

MeasureOttawaSan Juan
City population1,017,449342,259
People per km²3662,847
Museums within 10 km2018
UNESCO World Heritage sites within 50 km11
Swim season, months above 21 °C-12 months

Where else could you go?

Every comparison below shares a destination with this one, so you can follow Ottawa or San Juan 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. Sea surface temperature from NOAA OISST v2.1, NOAA Physical Sciences Laboratory. 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.