Paris or Lisbon?
Two destinations compared on nine measures of openly sourced data. Weight what matters to you and the verdict follows.
Your match
Too close to call, 1 point apart
Wins on sights concentration and nightlife with your weighting.
Wins on beaches & swimming and value for money with your weighting.
What matters to you?
Pick a travel style or drag the sliders. The match scores above update as you do.
The verdict
Choose Lisbon if you want a warm-weather city break with the coast attached: 24 beaches nearby, mild winters, and summers that stay dry.
Choose Paris if you want the denser centre, where most of what you came for is within walking distance, the wider choice of restaurants and a much larger going-out scene, and the sea is no loss to you.
Scoreboard
Each measure scored 0 to 100. Open a row for the figures behind the score.
Beaches & swimming. Lisbon leads by 57 points.57
| Paris | Lisbon | |
|---|---|---|
| Score | 0 | 57 |
| Swim season months | 0 | 0 |
| Beaches 10 km | 2 | 24 |
| Coast distance | 149 km | 2 km |
| Water distance | — | 2 km |
Places to eat. Paris leads by 10 points.10
| Paris | Lisbon | |
|---|---|---|
| Score | 90 | 80 |
| Restaurants within 2 km of centre | 4,732 | 2,496 |
| Effective number of cuisines within 2 km | 33 | 31 |
Museums & heritage. Paris leads by 6 points.6
| Paris | Lisbon | |
|---|---|---|
| Score | 76 | 70 |
| Museums within 10 km | 185 | 124 |
| Museums within 2 km of centre | 65 | 54 |
| Share of museums within 2 km % | 35 | 44 |
| Unesco sites within 50 km | 4 | 3 |
Nightlife. Paris leads by 23 points.23
| Paris | Lisbon | |
|---|---|---|
| Score | 88 | 65 |
| Drinking venues within 4 km | 3,796 | 1,225 |
| Drinking venues within 2 km of centre | 1,694 | 956 |
| Share of drinking venues within 2 km % | 45 | 78 |
| Nightclubs within 4 km | 201 | 65 |
Nature & day trips. Lisbon leads by 8 points.8
| Paris | Lisbon | |
|---|---|---|
| Score | 48 | 56 |
| Protected land share 50 km % | 28 | 11 |
| Landscape blanket share 50 km % | 26 | 0 |
| Land share of disc % | 100 | 54 |
| Park area within 2 km | 82 hectares | 77 hectares |
Good for families. Paris leads by 6 points.6
| Paris | Lisbon | |
|---|---|---|
| Score | 75 | 69 |
| Tourist attractions within 2 km | 89 | 82 |
| Park area within 2 km | 82 hectares | 77 hectares |
| Theme parks within 30 km | 3 | 1 |
Sights concentration. Paris leads by 28 points.28
| Paris | Lisbon | |
|---|---|---|
| Score | 94 | 66 |
| Notable places within 2 km | 865 | 169 |
| Min wikipedia languages | 5 | 5 |
Value for money. Lisbon leads by 12 points.12
| Paris | Lisbon | |
|---|---|---|
| Score | 62 | 74 |
| Price level global | 73.7 | 55.9 |
| Daily budget | €160 | €109 |
Year-round weather. Lisbon leads by 12 points.12
| Paris | Lisbon | |
|---|---|---|
| Score | 66 | 78 |
| Monthly daytime high | 7.8 °C to 26 °C | 14.9 °C to 28.4 °C |
| Monthly rainfall | 38 mm to 75 mm | 3 mm to 121 mm |
| Dry months | 1 | 4 |
Where they differ
Lisbon is the one with a coast attached: 24 beaches nearby against Paris's 2, with the sea at its warmest, 19°C, in September. Warmer air helps, daytime highs of 15-28°C across the year against 8-26°C. That makes an afternoon swim a realistic part of a city trip.
Paris packs many times as many notable places within walking distance of its centre, so days need less transport. It also has about three times as many bars and clubs, though Lisbon's cluster near the centre.
Where they are alike
Museums and heritage land in similar territory: Paris has somewhat more museums, but both fill several days indoors, and both sit within day-trip reach of a comparable set of UNESCO-listed places, 4 from Paris and 3 from Lisbon.
For families the two behave alike: similar numbers of attractions near the centre and similar park space, though Paris has 3 theme parks in reach against Lisbon's 1. Both also offer a similar range of kitchens, whatever the difference in numbers.
Which traveller are you?
Families with young children lean to Paris, which has 3 theme parks within reach against Lisbon's 1; otherwise the two are level on attractions and park space near the centre, and Lisbon adds beaches in summer.
Eaters and night owls want Paris: about twice as many restaurants near the centre and a far wider choice of bars and clubs, though Lisbon's sit closer together for a night on foot.
Anyone chasing sun and swimming wants Lisbon: 24 beaches nearby, summer highs of 26-28°C, and a winter mild enough for an out-of-season break.
What the numbers don't tell you
The daily budget figures, €109 for Portugal and €160 for France, are national estimates of restaurant and hotel price levels, not measurements of either city. Capitals and heavily visited cities can sit above their country's average, by more than the gap between the two figures, so this tells you little about what either trip costs.
No weather station near Paris records sunshine hours, so that side of the weather comparison is unmeasured and its monthly picture rests on temperature and rainfall alone. Lisbon's beach count also comes with a sea that never reaches 21°C, and its driest months are its warmest, when those beaches are busiest.
When should you go?
The figures behind each month. Each row is shaded against that destination's own year, so the deepest cell is its best month for that measure and the palest its weakest. Shades are not comparable between the two rows.
Temperature and rainfall are thirty-year climate normals, averaged over the years shown. Paris: 1991-2020 normals, Paris-Montsouris (4.6 km from centre). Lisbon: 1991-2020 normals, Lisboa / Geof (1.1 km from centre).
Lisbon is at its best from June to September: highs of 26-28°C, rainfall down to 3-13mm through those months, and the sea at its warmest, 19°C, at the end of the run. From October the rain sets in, over 100mm a month.
Paris is a wider window, May to September, with highs of 20-26°C, but rain is spread evenly at 51-75mm and no month is reliably dry, so pack for showers whenever you go. Winter is the weakest stretch.
Getting there
| Flying from | Paris | Lisbon |
|---|---|---|
| LondonLHR, LGW, STN, LTN +2 | 1 h 5 m €63-103 CDG · 22 km | 2 h 30 m €112-185 LIS · 7 km |
| MadridMAD | 1 h 55 m €107-141 ORY · 14 km | 1 h 15 m €64-74 LIS · 7 km |
| New YorkJFK, EWR, LGA | 7 h 30 m €579-648 1 stop CDG · 22 km | 7 h 0 m €621-718 1 stop LIS · 7 km |
| BarcelonaBCN | 1 h 40 m €110-135 CDG · 22 km | 1 h 50 m €74-97 LIS · 7 km |
| MilanMXP, BGY, LIN | 1 h 20 m €61-89 CDG · 22 km | 2 h 35 m €124-144 LIS · 7 km |
| AmsterdamAMS | 1 h 10 m €188-212 CDG · 22 km | 2 h 50 m €167-189 LIS · 7 km |
| Sao PauloGRU, VCP, CGH, RTE | 11 h 45 m €806-1124 CDG · 22 km | 10 h 0 m €744-1049 1 stop LIS · 7 km |
| PortoOPO | 2 h 5 m €113-136 ORY · 14 km | 1 h 0 m €93-107 LIS · 7 km |
| DubaiDXB, DWC | 6 h 50 m €292-389 1 stop CDG · 22 km | 7 h 55 m €421-500 2 stops LIS · 7 km |
| SeoulICN, GMP | 11 h 10 m €509-719 1 stop CDG · 22 km | 12 h 55 m no fares LIS · 7 km |
The busiest departure cities for these two, with a place kept for each other part of the world. Busiest means arriving passengers where an official count exists, and where none does, the number of non-stop services flown: official route statistics are published by the European reporting countries and by nobody else, so a table ranked on them alone would offer a reader in New York or Tokyo ten European cities. Flying times are estimated from the distance between airports, and every row is a city flown non-stop to both. Where the typical offer connects anyway, the stops are shown. Under each figure is the airport the flight lands at and how far that is from the centre, because the nearest airport is not always the one a route is flown to. Where both columns name the same airport it is one flight, and the difference between the two is the distance printed beside it. Typical return fares for 2026-08 to 2026-10, cached market data up to 7 days old. The figure is the middle half of the offers found, so a single price means they agreed and a range means they did not; for a typical route that middle half spans about a quarter of the median, and for the least settled routes rather more than the median itself.
Before you go
| Measure | Paris | Lisbon |
|---|---|---|
| Official language | French | Portuguese |
| Currency | Euro (EUR) | Euro (EUR) |
| Sockets | CE230 V, 50 Hz | CF230 V, 50 Hz |
| Driving side | Right | Right |
| Time zone | UTC+1, UTC+2 in summer | UTC, UTC+1 in summer |
| Emergency number | 112 | 112 |
| Elevation | 27 m | 100 m |
| Main airport | Charles de Gaulle International Airport (CDG)22 km from centre277 non-stop destinations | Lisbon Humberto Delgado Airport (LIS)7 km from centre153 non-stop destinations |
| Public holidays this year | 11 days | 14 days |
By the numbers
| Measure | Paris | Lisbon |
|---|---|---|
| City population | 2,103,778 | 545,796 |
| People per km² | 19,960 | 5,453 |
| Museums within 10 km | 251 | 78 |
| UNESCO World Heritage sites within 50 km | 4 | 3 |
| Distinct cuisines in the centre | 169 | 106 |
| Swim season, months above 21 °C | – | None |
Where else could you go?
Every comparison below shares a destination with this one, so you can follow Paris or Lisbon somewhere new.