VacationSelector
Playa Manzanillo, Puerto Escondido
Puerto EscondidoPlaya Manzanillo
Playa Tamarindo, Tamarindo
TamarindoPlaya Tamarindo

Photos: Puerto Escondido by theklan, CC BY-SA 2.0, cropped; Tamarindo by Jarle Naustvik, CC BY 2.0, cropped.

Puerto Escondido or Tamarindo?

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 Puerto Escondido for

  • prices
  • wellness
  • food and drink

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

Choose Tamarindo for

  • families
  • beaches

What lies behind each score is written up on Tamarindo’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. Puerto Escondido 82, Tamarindo 85: Tamarindo leads by 3 points.
Food & drink. Puerto Escondido 48, Tamarindo 38: Puerto Escondido leads by 10 points.
Culture & sights. Puerto Escondido 8, Tamarindo 5: Puerto Escondido leads by 3 points.
Nightlife. Puerto Escondido and Tamarindo are level on 45.
Nature & outdoors. Puerto Escondido 78, Tamarindo 76: Puerto Escondido leads by 2 points.
Day trips. Puerto Escondido 35, Tamarindo 28: Puerto Escondido leads by 7 points.
Good for families. Puerto Escondido 42, Tamarindo 55: Tamarindo leads by 13 points.
Getting around. Puerto Escondido 40, Tamarindo 32: Puerto Escondido leads by 8 points.
Shopping & style. Puerto Escondido 22, Tamarindo 18: Puerto Escondido leads by 4 points.
Affordability. Puerto Escondido 68, Tamarindo 36: Puerto Escondido leads by 32 points.
Live music & performing arts. Puerto Escondido 12, Tamarindo 10: Puerto Escondido leads by 2 points.
Wellness & relaxation. Puerto Escondido 58, Tamarindo 45: Puerto Escondido leads by 13 points.
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What lies behind each score is written up on the two cities’ own pages: Puerto Escondido and Tamarindo.

Your match

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

Puerto Escondido
Best match
45match

Wins on prices and wellness with your weighting.

Tamarindo
39match

Wins on families and beaches with your weighting.

What matters to you?

When should you go?

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

Puerto Escondido in July

33 °Cdaytime high
24 °Cnight-time low
116 mmrain in the month
7 hsunshine a day
30 °Csea
13 hdaylight a day

Tamarindo in July

33 °Cdaytime high
23 °Cnight-time low
129 mmrain in the month
No recordsunshine a day
29 °Csea
13 hdaylight a day

Daytime high, °C

0°10°20°30°40°JFMAMJJASOND

Rainfall in the month, mm

0100200300400JFMAMJJASOND
Puerto EscondidoTamarindo

Where the figures come from

Puerto Escondido's temperatures are measured 66 km from the centre, at Puerto Angel, Oax..

Puerto Escondido 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.

Tamarindo's temperatures are measured 54 km from the centre, at Liberia.

Tamarindo 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. Puerto Escondido: 1991-2020 normals, Puerto Angel, Oax. (65.6 km from centre). Tamarindo: 1991-2020 normals, Liberia (53.8 km from centre).

Before you go

MeasurePuerto EscondidoTamarindo
Official languageSpanish, Nahuatl, Yucatec MayaSpanish
CurrencyMexican Peso (MXN)Costa Rican Colon (CRC)
SocketsAB127 V, 60 HzAB120 V, 60 Hz
Driving sideRightRight
Time zoneUTC-6UTC-6
Emergency number911911
Elevation60 m27 m
Main airportPuerto Escondido International Airport (PXM)2 km from centre10 non-stop destinationsDaniel Oduber Quirós International Airport (LIR)43 km from centre30 non-stop destinations
Public holidays this year9 days11 days

By the numbers

MeasurePuerto EscondidoTamarindo
City population29,9037,132
People per km²-57
Museums within 10 km00
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 Puerto Escondido or Tamarindo somewhere new.

Browse every destination

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). Public holidays from Nager.Date (MIT). 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. 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.