VacationSelector
Portofino and its bay from the hillside, Portofino
PortofinoPortofino and its bay from the hillside
The Golden Gate Bridge, San Francisco
San FranciscoThe Golden Gate Bridge

Photos: Portofino by Michal Osmenda, CC BY 2.0, cropped; San Francisco by Elijah Cobb, Pexels License.

Portofino or San Francisco?

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 Portofino for

  • beaches
  • day trips

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

Choose San Francisco for

  • live music and the arts
  • food and drink
  • culture and sights

What lies behind each score is written up on San Francisco’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. Portofino 60, San Francisco 25: Portofino leads by 35 points.
Food & drink. Portofino 36, San Francisco 82: San Francisco leads by 46 points.
Culture & sights. Portofino 22, San Francisco 68: San Francisco leads by 46 points.
Nightlife. Portofino 14, San Francisco 58: San Francisco leads by 44 points.
Nature & outdoors. Portofino 77, San Francisco 80: San Francisco leads by 3 points.
Day trips. Portofino 76, San Francisco 72: Portofino leads by 4 points.
Good for families. Portofino 33, San Francisco 66: San Francisco leads by 33 points.
Getting around. Portofino 50, San Francisco 70: San Francisco leads by 20 points.
Shopping & style. Portofino 29, San Francisco 58: San Francisco leads by 29 points.
Affordability. Portofino 9, San Francisco 14: San Francisco leads by 5 points.
Live music & performing arts. Portofino 7, San Francisco 76: San Francisco leads by 69 points.
Wellness & relaxation. Portofino and San Francisco are level on 42.
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What lies behind each score is written up on the two cities’ own pages: Portofino and San Francisco.

Your match

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

Portofino
38match

Wins on beaches and day trips with your weighting.

San Francisco
Best match
59match

Wins on live music and the arts 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.

Portofino in July

27 °Cdaytime high
22 °Cnight-time low
32 mmrain in the month
24 °Csea
15 hdaylight a day

San Francisco in July

22 °Cdaytime high
14 °Cnight-time low
0 mmrain in the month
13 °Csea
15 hdaylight a day

Daytime high, °C

0°10°20°30°JFMAMJJASOND

Rainfall in the month, mm

050100150200250JFMAMJJASOND
PortofinoSan Francisco

Where the figures come from

Portofino's temperatures are measured 31 km from the centre, at Genova / Sestri.

Portofino 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. Portofino: 1991-2020 normals, Genova / Sestri (31 km from centre). San Francisco: 1981-2010 normals, Alameda Naval Air Station (9.1 km from centre).

Before you go

MeasurePortofinoSan Francisco
Official languageItalian-
CurrencyEuro (EUR)US Dollar (USD)
SocketsCFL230 V, 50 HzAB120 V, 60 Hz
Driving sideRightRight
Time zoneUTC+1, UTC+2 in summerUTC-8, UTC-7 in summer
Emergency number112911
Elevation20 m16 m
Main airportGenoa Cristoforo Colombo Airport (GOA)32 km from centre25 non-stop destinationsSan Francisco International Airport (SFO)18 km from centre142 non-stop destinations
Public holidays this year13 days13 days

By the numbers

MeasurePortofinoSan Francisco
City population355873,965
People per km²1421,455
Museums within 10 km1451
UNESCO World Heritage sites within 50 km20
Swim season, months above 21 °C4 monthsNone

Where else could you go?

Every comparison below shares a destination with this one, so you can follow Portofino or San Francisco 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). Tourism statistics from Eurostat, © European Union, reused under CC BY 4.0. Public holidays from Nager.Date (MIT). 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. Exchange rates via Frankfurter, based on European Central Bank reference rates. 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.