VacationSelector
The Big Buddha on the hill above Phuket, Phuket
PhuketThe Big Buddha on the hill above Phuket
El Castillo above the beach at Tulum, Tulum
TulumEl Castillo above the beach at Tulum

Photos: Phuket by Mussi Katz, CC0; Tulum by Bjørn Christian Tørrissen, CC BY-SA 3.0, cropped.

Phuket or Tulum?

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

  • prices
  • food and drink
  • nightlife

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

Choose Tulum for

  • day trips
  • getting around
  • wellness

What lies behind each score is written up on Tulum’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, Tulum 88: Phuket leads by 2 points.
Food & drink. Phuket 66, Tulum 52: Phuket leads by 14 points.
Culture & sights. Phuket 35, Tulum 30: Phuket leads by 5 points.
Nightlife. Phuket 72, Tulum 60: Phuket leads by 12 points.
Nature & outdoors. Phuket 80, Tulum 76: Phuket leads by 4 points.
Day trips. Phuket 45, Tulum 68: Tulum leads by 23 points.
Good for families. Phuket 65, Tulum 60: Phuket leads by 5 points.
Getting around. Phuket 22, Tulum 25: Tulum leads by 3 points.
Shopping & style. Phuket 42, Tulum 35: Phuket leads by 7 points.
Affordability. Phuket 68, Tulum 30: Phuket leads by 38 points.
Live music & performing arts. Phuket 20, Tulum 15: Phuket leads by 5 points.
Wellness & relaxation. Phuket 82, Tulum 85: Tulum leads by 3 points.
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What lies behind each score is written up on the two cities’ own pages: Phuket and Tulum.

Your match

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

Phuket
Best match
57match

Wins on prices and food and drink with your weighting.

Tulum
52match

Wins on day trips and getting around 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

Tulum in July

30 °Cdaytime high
26 °Cnight-time low
116 mmrain in the month
29 °Csea
13 hdaylight a day

Daytime high, °C

0°10°20°30°40°JFMAMJJASOND

Rainfall in the month, mm

0100200300400JFMAMJJASOND
PhuketTulum

Where the figures come from

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

Tulum 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. Phuket: 1991-2020 (rainfall 1961-1990) normals, Phuket Airport (26.9 km from centre). Tulum: 2001-2020 normals, NASA POWER reanalysis grid, no weather station within 90 km.

Before you go

MeasurePhuketTulum
Official languageThaiSpanish, Nahuatl, Yucatec Maya
CurrencyBaht (THB)Mexican Peso (MXN)
SocketsABCF220 V, 50 HzAB127 V, 60 Hz
Driving sideLeftRight
Time zoneUTC+7UTC-5
Emergency numberPolice 191, ambulance 1669, fire 199911
Elevation19 m5 m
Main airportPhuket International Airport (HKT)27 km from centre85 non-stop destinationsFelipe Carrillo Puerto International Airport Tulum (TQO)21 km from centre11 non-stop destinations
Public holidays this year-9 days

By the numbers

MeasurePhuketTulum
City population77,61033,374
People per km²6,468-
Museums within 10 km20
UNESCO World Heritage sites within 50 km00
Swim season, months above 21 °C12 months12 months

Where else could you go?

Every comparison below shares a destination with this one, so you can follow Phuket or Tulum 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. Temperature and rainfall for destinations with no weather station are from the NASA POWER 2001-2020 climatology, derived from MERRA-2. 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 2026-10-31. Daily budgets are estimates from country price levels.