VacationSelector
Playa de los Muertos below the green hills, Puerto Vallarta
Puerto VallartaPlaya de los Muertos below the green hills
The red cable car above Wellington, Wellington
WellingtonThe red cable car above Wellington

Photos: Puerto Vallarta by RL0919, CC BY-SA 4.0, cropped; Wellington by lumoplank, CC0.

Puerto Vallarta or Wellington?

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

  • beaches
  • prices
  • wellness

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

Choose Wellington for

  • live music and the arts
  • getting around
  • culture and sights

What lies behind each score is written up on Wellington’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 85, Wellington 33: Puerto Vallarta leads by 52 points.
Food & drink. Puerto Vallarta and Wellington are level on 62.
Culture & sights. Puerto Vallarta 28, Wellington 44: Wellington leads by 16 points.
Nightlife. Puerto Vallarta 66, Wellington 45: Puerto Vallarta leads by 21 points.
Nature & outdoors. Puerto Vallarta 76, Wellington 78: Wellington leads by 2 points.
Day trips. Puerto Vallarta 55, Wellington 40: Puerto Vallarta leads by 15 points.
Good for families. Puerto Vallarta 65, Wellington 62: Puerto Vallarta leads by 3 points.
Getting around. Puerto Vallarta 45, Wellington 68: Wellington leads by 23 points.
Shopping & style. Puerto Vallarta and Wellington are level on 42.
Affordability. Puerto Vallarta 60, Wellington 33: Puerto Vallarta leads by 27 points.
Live music & performing arts. Puerto Vallarta 32, Wellington 56: Wellington leads by 24 points.
Wellness & relaxation. Puerto Vallarta 52, Wellington 30: Puerto Vallarta leads by 22 points.
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What lies behind each score is written up on the two cities’ own pages: Puerto Vallarta and Wellington.

Your match

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

Puerto Vallarta
Best match
56match

Wins on beaches and prices with your weighting.

Wellington
49match

Wins on live music and the arts 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.

Puerto Vallarta in July

34 °Cdaytime high
24 °Cnight-time low
209 mmrain in the month
No recordsunshine a day
30 °Csea
13 hdaylight a day

Wellington in July

12 °Cdaytime high
7 °Cnight-time low
111 mmrain in the month
4 hsunshine a day
12 °Csea
10 hdaylight a day

Daytime high, °C

0°10°20°30°40°JFMAMJJASOND

Rainfall in the month, mm

0100200300JFMAMJJASOND
Puerto VallartaWellington

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.

Wellington's sunshine is measured 47 km from the centre, at Paraparaumu Aerodrome.

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. Wellington: 1961-1990 (sunshine 1991-2020) normals, Wellington Aerodrome Aws (5.3 km from centre).

Before you go

MeasurePuerto VallartaWellington
Official languageSpanish, Nahuatl, Yucatec MayaEnglish, New Zealand Sign Language, Māori
CurrencyMexican Peso (MXN)New Zealand Dollar (NZD)
SocketsAB127 V, 60 HzI230 V, 50 Hz
Driving sideRightLeft
Time zoneUTC-6UTC+12, UTC+13 in summer
Emergency number911111
Elevation101 m0 m
Main airportPuerto Vallarta International Airport (PVR)5 km from centre52 non-stop destinationsWellington International Airport (WLG)5 km from centre20 non-stop destinations
Public holidays this year9 days12 days

By the numbers

MeasurePuerto VallartaWellington
City population224,166216,200
People per km²4,311487
Museums within 10 km212
UNESCO World Heritage sites within 50 km10
Swim season, months above 21 °C12 monthsNone

Where else could you go?

Every comparison below shares a destination with this one, so you can follow Puerto Vallarta or Wellington 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 2026-11-01. Daily budgets are estimates from country price levels.