VacationSelector
Parliament Hill across the Ottawa River, Ottawa
OttawaParliament Hill across the Ottawa River
The main beach with the green hills behind, Sayulita
SayulitaThe main beach with the green hills behind

Photos: Ottawa by Dennis G. Jarvis, CC BY-SA 2.0, cropped; Sayulita by Luisalvaz, CC BY-SA 4.0, cropped.

Ottawa or Sayulita?

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

  • culture and sights
  • live music and the arts
  • families

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

Choose Sayulita for

  • beaches
  • prices
  • nature and the outdoors

What lies behind each score is written up on Sayulita’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, Sayulita 80: Sayulita leads by 45 points.
Food & drink. Ottawa 45, Sayulita 42: Ottawa leads by 3 points.
Culture & sights. Ottawa 62, Sayulita 7: Ottawa leads by 55 points.
Nightlife. Ottawa 35, Sayulita 33: Ottawa leads by 2 points.
Nature & outdoors. Ottawa 68, Sayulita 72: Sayulita leads by 4 points.
Day trips. Ottawa 55, Sayulita 42: Ottawa leads by 13 points.
Good for families. Ottawa 68, Sayulita 42: Ottawa leads by 26 points.
Getting around. Ottawa 62, Sayulita 48: Ottawa leads by 14 points.
Shopping & style. Ottawa 40, Sayulita 33: Ottawa leads by 7 points.
Affordability. Ottawa 40, Sayulita 45: Sayulita leads by 5 points.
Live music & performing arts. Ottawa 52, Sayulita 12: Ottawa leads by 40 points.
Wellness & relaxation. Ottawa 55, Sayulita 58: Sayulita leads by 3 points.
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What lies behind each score is written up on the two cities’ own pages: Ottawa and Sayulita.

Your match

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

Ottawa
Best match
51match

Wins on culture and sights and live music and the arts with your weighting.

Sayulita
43match

Wins on beaches 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.

Ottawa in July

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

Sayulita in July

29 °Cdaytime high
27 °Cnight-time low
342 mmrain in the month
30 °Csea
13 hdaylight a day

Daytime high, °C

-10°0°10°20°30°JFMAMJJASOND

Rainfall in the month, mm

0100200300400JFMAMJJASOND
OttawaSayulita

Where the figures come from

Sayulita 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. Ottawa: 1991-2020 normals, Ottawa CDA RCS (5.3 km from centre). Sayulita: 2001-2020 normals, NASA POWER reanalysis grid, no weather station within 90 km.

Before you go

MeasureOttawaSayulita
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 m2 m
Main airportOttawa Macdonald-Cartier International Airport (YOW)12 km from centre46 non-stop destinationsPuerto Vallarta International Airport (PVR)29 km from centre52 non-stop destinations
Public holidays this year11 days9 days

By the numbers

MeasureOttawaSayulita
City population1,017,4493,390
People per km²366-
Museums within 10 km200
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 Sayulita 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. Temperature and rainfall for destinations with no weather station are from the NASA POWER 2001-2020 climatology, derived from MERRA-2. 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 2026-11-02. Daily budgets are estimates from country price levels.