VacationSelector
The Big Buddha on the hill above Phuket, Phuket
PhuketThe Big Buddha on the hill above Phuket
Mountain Village under snow, seen from the gondola, Telluride
TellurideMountain Village under snow, seen from the gondola

Photos: Phuket by Mussi Katz, CC0; Telluride by Murray Foubister, CC BY-SA 2.0, cropped.

Phuket or Telluride?

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 Phuket for

  • beaches
  • prices
  • nightlife

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

Choose Telluride for

  • getting around
  • live music and the arts
  • nature and the outdoors

What lies behind each score is written up on Telluride’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. Phuket 90, Telluride 5: Phuket leads by 85 points.
Food & drink. Phuket 66, Telluride 38: Phuket leads by 28 points.
Culture & sights. Phuket 35, Telluride 20: Phuket leads by 15 points.
Nightlife. Phuket 72, Telluride 20: Phuket leads by 52 points.
Nature & outdoors. Phuket 80, Telluride 93: Telluride leads by 13 points.
Day trips. Phuket 45, Telluride 30: Phuket leads by 15 points.
Good for families. Phuket 65, Telluride 45: Phuket leads by 20 points.
Getting around. Phuket 22, Telluride 66: Telluride leads by 44 points.
Shopping & style. Phuket 42, Telluride 25: Phuket leads by 17 points.
Affordability. Phuket 68, Telluride 7: Phuket leads by 61 points.
Live music & performing arts. Phuket 20, Telluride 35: Telluride leads by 15 points.
Wellness & relaxation. Phuket 82, Telluride 45: Phuket leads by 37 points.
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What lies behind each score is written up on the two cities’ own pages: Phuket and Telluride.

Your match

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

Phuket
Best match
57match

Wins on beaches and prices with your weighting.

Telluride
36match

Wins on getting around and live music and the arts with your weighting.

What matters to you?

When should you go?

Pick your month. The climate figures are measured averages, not a forecast.

Phuket in July

32 °Cdaytime high
24 °Cnight-time low
287 mmrain in the month
30 °Csea
13 hdaylight a day

Telluride in July

23 °Cdaytime high
12 °Cnight-time low
58 mmrain in the month
No seasea
15 hdaylight a day

Daytime high, °C

0°10°20°30°40°JFMAMJJASOND

Rainfall in the month, mm

0100200300400JFMAMJJASOND
PhuketTelluride

Where the figures come from

Phuket's temperatures are measured 27 km from the centre, at Phuket Airport.

Telluride 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. Phuket: 1991-2020 (rainfall 1961-1990) normals, Phuket Airport (26.9 km from centre). Telluride: 2006-2020 (rainfall 1991-2020) normals, Telluride / Lime (8.2 km from centre).

Before you go

MeasurePhuketTelluride
Official languageThai-
CurrencyBaht (THB)US Dollar (USD)
SocketsABCF220 V, 50 HzAB120 V, 60 Hz
Driving sideLeftRight
Time zoneUTC+7UTC-7, UTC-6 in summer
Emergency numberPolice 191, ambulance 1669, fire 199911
Elevation19 m2,667 m
Main airportPhuket International Airport (HKT)27 km from centre85 non-stop destinationsMontrose Regional Airport (MTJ)64 km from centre11 non-stop destinations
Public holidays this year-12 days

By the numbers

MeasurePhuketTelluride
City population77,6102,607
People per km²6,4681,372
Museums within 10 km20
UNESCO World Heritage sites within 50 km00
Swim season, months above 21 °C12 months-

Where else could you go?

Every comparison below shares a destination with this one, so you can follow Phuket or Telluride somewhere new.

Browse every destination

Sources

Ground elevations sampled from the Mapzen terrain tiles via OpenTopoData, merging SRTM, ASTER, NED, EU-DEM and national 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). 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. Public holidays from Nager.Date (MIT). 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.