VacationSelector
Portofino and its bay from the hillside, Portofino
PortofinoPortofino and its bay from the hillside
The Oriental Pearl Tower and Shanghai Tower, Shanghai
ShanghaiThe Oriental Pearl Tower and Shanghai Tower

Photos: Portofino by Michal Osmenda, CC BY 2.0, cropped; Shanghai by xiquinhosilva, CC BY 2.0, cropped.

Portofino or Shanghai?

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

  • nature and the outdoors
  • beaches

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

Choose Shanghai for

  • nightlife
  • live music and the arts
  • shopping

What lies behind each score is written up on Shanghai’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, Shanghai 10: Portofino leads by 50 points.
Food & drink. Portofino 36, Shanghai 88: Shanghai leads by 52 points.
Culture & sights. Portofino 22, Shanghai 72: Shanghai leads by 50 points.
Nightlife. Portofino 14, Shanghai 80: Shanghai leads by 66 points.
Nature & outdoors. Portofino 77, Shanghai 25: Portofino leads by 52 points.
Day trips. Portofino 76, Shanghai 90: Shanghai leads by 14 points.
Good for families. Portofino 33, Shanghai 80: Shanghai leads by 47 points.
Getting around. Portofino 50, Shanghai 85: Shanghai leads by 35 points.
Shopping & style. Portofino 29, Shanghai 82: Shanghai leads by 53 points.
Affordability. Portofino 9, Shanghai 55: Shanghai leads by 46 points.
Live music & performing arts. Portofino 7, Shanghai 66: Shanghai leads by 59 points.
Wellness & relaxation. Portofino 42, Shanghai 55: Shanghai leads by 13 points.
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What lies behind each score is written up on the two cities’ own pages: Portofino and Shanghai.

Your match

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

Portofino
38match

Wins on nature and the outdoors and beaches with your weighting.

Shanghai
Best match
66match

Wins on nightlife 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.

Portofino in July

27 °Cdaytime high
22 °Cnight-time low
32 mmrain in the month
No recordsunshine a day
24 °Csea
15 hdaylight a day

Shanghai in July

33 °Cdaytime high
26 °Cnight-time low
151 mmrain in the month
6 hsunshine a day
26 °Csea
14 hdaylight a day

Daytime high, °C

0°10°20°30°40°JFMAMJJASOND

Rainfall in the month, mm

050100150200250JFMAMJJASOND
PortofinoShanghai

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). Shanghai: 1991-2020 normals, Shanghai / Hongqiao (8.1 km from centre).

Before you go

MeasurePortofinoShanghai
Official languageItalianPutonghua
CurrencyEuro (EUR)Yuan Renminbi (CNY)
SocketsCFL230 V, 50 HzACI220 V, 50 Hz
Driving sideRightRight
Time zoneUTC+1, UTC+2 in summerUTC+8
Emergency number112Police 110, ambulance 120, fire 119
Elevation20 m4 m
Main airportGenoa Cristoforo Colombo Airport (GOA)32 km from centre25 non-stop destinationsShanghai Pudong International Airport (PVG)33 km from centre207 non-stop destinations
Public holidays this year13 days6 days

By the numbers

MeasurePortofinoShanghai
City population35524,870,895
People per km²1423,922
Museums within 10 km1445
UNESCO World Heritage sites within 50 km20
Swim season, months above 21 °C4 months5 months

Where else could you go?

Every comparison below shares a destination with this one, so you can follow Portofino or Shanghai 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.