VacationSelector
Playa de los Muertos below the green hills, Puerto Vallarta
Puerto VallartaPlaya de los Muertos below the green hills
Playa Tamarindo, Tamarindo
TamarindoPlaya Tamarindo

Photos: Puerto Vallarta by RL0919, CC BY-SA 4.0, cropped; Tamarindo by Jarle Naustvik, CC BY 2.0, cropped.

Puerto Vallarta 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 Vallarta for

  • day trips
  • food and drink
  • shopping

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

Choose Tamarindo for

Tamarindo does not lead in any category we score.

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 Vallarta and Tamarindo are level on 85.
Food & drink. Puerto Vallarta 62, Tamarindo 38: Puerto Vallarta leads by 24 points.
Culture & sights. Puerto Vallarta 28, Tamarindo 5: Puerto Vallarta leads by 23 points.
Nightlife. Puerto Vallarta 66, Tamarindo 45: Puerto Vallarta leads by 21 points.
Nature & outdoors. Puerto Vallarta and Tamarindo are level on 76.
Day trips. Puerto Vallarta 55, Tamarindo 28: Puerto Vallarta leads by 27 points.
Good for families. Puerto Vallarta 65, Tamarindo 55: Puerto Vallarta leads by 10 points.
Getting around. Puerto Vallarta 45, Tamarindo 32: Puerto Vallarta leads by 13 points.
Shopping & style. Puerto Vallarta 42, Tamarindo 18: Puerto Vallarta leads by 24 points.
Affordability. Puerto Vallarta 60, Tamarindo 36: Puerto Vallarta leads by 24 points.
Live music & performing arts. Puerto Vallarta 32, Tamarindo 10: Puerto Vallarta leads by 22 points.
Wellness & relaxation. Puerto Vallarta 52, Tamarindo 45: Puerto Vallarta leads by 7 points.
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What lies behind each score is written up on the two cities’ own pages: Puerto Vallarta and Tamarindo.

Your match

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

Puerto Vallarta
Best match
56match

Wins on day trips and food and drink with your weighting.

Tamarindo
39match

Has no clear advantage with the weighting you have chosen.

What matters to you?

When should you go?

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

Puerto Vallarta in July

34 °Cdaytime high
24 °Cnight-time low
209 mmrain in the month
30 °Csea
13 hdaylight a day

Tamarindo in July

33 °Cdaytime high
23 °Cnight-time low
129 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
Puerto VallartaTamarindo

Where the figures come from

Puerto Vallarta 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.

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 Vallarta: 1991-2020 normals, TerraClimate 4 km grid at the town, no weather station within 90 km. Tamarindo: 1991-2020 normals, Liberia (53.8 km from centre).

Before you go

MeasurePuerto VallartaTamarindo
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
Elevation101 m27 m
Main airportPuerto Vallarta International Airport (PVR)5 km from centre52 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 VallartaTamarindo
City population224,1667,132
People per km²4,31157
Museums within 10 km20
UNESCO World Heritage sites within 50 km10
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 Vallarta or Tamarindo somewhere new.

Browse every destination

Sources

Structured data from Wikidata (CC0). Temperature and rainfall for destinations with no weather station are from the NASA POWER 2001-2020 climatology, derived from MERRA-2. 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. Weather data by Meteostat. Meteorological data provided by NOAA, DWD and others. 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.