VacationSelector
Playa de los Muertos below the green hills, Puerto Vallarta
Puerto VallartaPlaya de los Muertos below the green hills
The Limmat from Quaibrücke, Zurich
ZurichThe Limmat from Quaibrücke

Photos: Puerto Vallarta by RL0919, CC BY-SA 4.0, cropped; Zurich by Daniel Kraft, CC BY-SA 3.0, cropped.

Puerto Vallarta or Zurich?

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

  • prices
  • beaches
  • food and drink

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

Choose Zurich for

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

What lies behind each score is written up on Zurich’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, Zurich 45: Puerto Vallarta leads by 40 points.
Food & drink. Puerto Vallarta 62, Zurich 53: Puerto Vallarta leads by 9 points.
Culture & sights. Puerto Vallarta 28, Zurich 58: Zurich leads by 30 points.
Nightlife. Puerto Vallarta 66, Zurich 62: Puerto Vallarta leads by 4 points.
Nature & outdoors. Puerto Vallarta 76, Zurich 80: Zurich leads by 4 points.
Day trips. Puerto Vallarta 55, Zurich 84: Zurich leads by 29 points.
Good for families. Puerto Vallarta 65, Zurich 76: Zurich leads by 11 points.
Getting around. Puerto Vallarta 45, Zurich 95: Zurich leads by 50 points.
Shopping & style. Puerto Vallarta 42, Zurich 66: Zurich leads by 24 points.
Affordability. Puerto Vallarta 60, Zurich 3: Puerto Vallarta leads by 57 points.
Live music & performing arts. Puerto Vallarta 32, Zurich 70: Zurich leads by 38 points.
Wellness & relaxation. Puerto Vallarta 52, Zurich 58: Zurich leads by 6 points.
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What lies behind each score is written up on the two cities’ own pages: Puerto Vallarta and Zurich.

Your match

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

Puerto Vallarta
56match

Wins on prices and beaches with your weighting.

Zurich
Best match
63match

Wins on getting around 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.

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

Zurich in July

24 °Cdaytime high
15 °Cnight-time low
126 mmrain in the month
7 hsunshine a day
No seasea
16 hdaylight a day

Daytime high, °C

0°10°20°30°40°JFMAMJJASOND

Rainfall in the month, mm

0100200300JFMAMJJASOND
Puerto VallartaZurich

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.

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. Zurich: 1991-2020 normals, Zurich Town / Ville. (2.2 km from centre).

Before you go

MeasurePuerto VallartaZurich
Official languageSpanish, Nahuatl, Yucatec MayaFrench, German, Italian, Romansh
CurrencyMexican Peso (MXN)Swiss Franc (CHF)
SocketsAB127 V, 60 HzCJ230 V, 50 Hz
Driving sideRightRight
Time zoneUTC-6UTC+1, UTC+2 in summer
Emergency number911112
Elevation101 m408 m
Main airportPuerto Vallarta International Airport (PVR)5 km from centre52 non-stop destinationsZürich Airport (ZRH)9 km from centre226 non-stop destinations
Public holidays this year9 days10 days

By the numbers

MeasurePuerto VallartaZurich
City population224,166440,935
People per km²4,3115,016
Museums within 10 km263
UNESCO World Heritage sites within 50 km11
Swim season, months above 21 °C12 months-

Where else could you go?

Every comparison below shares a destination with this one, so you can follow Puerto Vallarta or Zurich 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. Tourism statistics from Eurostat, © European Union, reused under CC BY 4.0. 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 2026-10-31. Daily budgets are estimates from country price levels.