VacationSelector
Parliament Hill across the Ottawa River, Ottawa
OttawaParliament Hill across the Ottawa River
A cobbled street of painted houses in the old town, San Miguel de Allende
San Miguel de AllendeA cobbled street of painted houses in the old town

Photos: Ottawa by Dennis G. Jarvis, CC BY-SA 2.0, cropped; San Miguel de Allende by Russ Bowling, CC BY 2.0, cropped.

Ottawa or San Miguel de Allende?

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

  • families
  • beaches
  • nature and the outdoors

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

Choose San Miguel de Allende for

  • day trips
  • food and drink
  • shopping

What lies behind each score is written up on San Miguel de Allende’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 Miguel de Allende 4: Ottawa leads by 31 points.
Food & drink. Ottawa 45, San Miguel de Allende 62: San Miguel de Allende leads by 17 points.
Culture & sights. Ottawa and San Miguel de Allende are level on 62.
Nightlife. Ottawa 35, San Miguel de Allende 38: San Miguel de Allende leads by 3 points.
Nature & outdoors. Ottawa 68, San Miguel de Allende 40: Ottawa leads by 28 points.
Day trips. Ottawa 55, San Miguel de Allende 77: San Miguel de Allende leads by 22 points.
Good for families. Ottawa 68, San Miguel de Allende 32: Ottawa leads by 36 points.
Getting around. Ottawa 62, San Miguel de Allende 48: Ottawa leads by 14 points.
Shopping & style. Ottawa 40, San Miguel de Allende 55: San Miguel de Allende leads by 15 points.
Affordability. Ottawa 40, San Miguel de Allende 50: San Miguel de Allende leads by 10 points.
Live music & performing arts. Ottawa 52, San Miguel de Allende 40: Ottawa leads by 12 points.
Wellness & relaxation. Ottawa 55, San Miguel de Allende 66: San Miguel de Allende leads by 11 points.
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What lies behind each score is written up on the two cities’ own pages: Ottawa and San Miguel de Allende.

Your match

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

Ottawa
Best match
51match

Wins on families and beaches with your weighting.

San Miguel de Allende
48match

Wins on day trips 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.

Ottawa in July

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

San Miguel de Allende in July

29 °Cdaytime high
14 °Cnight-time low
132 mmrain in the month
7 hsunshine a day
13 hdaylight a day

Daytime high, °C

-10°0°10°20°30°40°JFMAMJJASOND

Rainfall in the month, mm

050100150JFMAMJJASOND
OttawaSan Miguel de Allende

Where the figures come from

San Miguel de Allende's temperatures are measured 54 km from the centre, at Guanajuato, Gto..

San Miguel de Allende 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.

Temperature and rainfall are climate normals, averaged over the years shown. Ottawa: 1991-2020 normals, Ottawa CDA RCS (5.3 km from centre). San Miguel de Allende: 1991-2020 normals, Guanajuato, Gto. (53.7 km from centre).

Before you go

MeasureOttawaSan Miguel de Allende
Official languageFrench, EnglishSpanish, Nahuatl, Yucatec Maya
CurrencyCanadian Dollar (CAD)Mexican Peso (MXN)
SocketsAB120 V, 60 HzAB127 V, 60 Hz
Driving sideRightRight
Time zoneUTC-5, UTC-4 in summerUTC-6
Emergency number911911
Elevation70 m1,900 m
Main airportOttawa Macdonald-Cartier International Airport (YOW)12 km from centre46 non-stop destinationsGuanajuato International Airport (BJX)77 km from centre22 non-stop destinations
Public holidays this year11 days9 days

By the numbers

MeasureOttawaSan Miguel de Allende
City population1,017,44969,811
People per km²366-
Museums within 10 km202
UNESCO World Heritage sites within 50 km12

Where else could you go?

Every comparison below shares a destination with this one, so you can follow Ottawa or San Miguel de Allende 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. 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 2026-11-01. Daily budgets are estimates from country price levels.