VacationSelector
The church of San Francisco under a blue sky, Quito
QuitoThe church of San Francisco under a blue sky
A cobbled street of painted houses in the old town, San Miguel de Allende
San Miguel de AllendeA cobbled street of painted houses in the old town

Photos: Quito by Bernard Gagnon, CC BY-SA 3.0, cropped; San Miguel de Allende by Russ Bowling, CC BY 2.0, cropped.

Quito or San Miguel de Allende?

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 Quito for

  • nature and the outdoors
  • prices
  • culture and sights

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

Choose San Miguel de Allende for

  • day trips
  • wellness
  • shopping

What lies behind each score is written up on San Miguel de Allende’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. Quito 5, San Miguel de Allende 4: Quito leads by 1 points.
Food & drink. Quito 54, San Miguel de Allende 62: San Miguel de Allende leads by 8 points.
Culture & sights. Quito 77, San Miguel de Allende 62: Quito leads by 15 points.
Nightlife. Quito 40, San Miguel de Allende 38: Quito leads by 2 points.
Nature & outdoors. Quito 86, San Miguel de Allende 40: Quito leads by 46 points.
Day trips. Quito 55, San Miguel de Allende 77: San Miguel de Allende leads by 22 points.
Good for families. Quito and San Miguel de Allende are level on 32.
Getting around. Quito 45, San Miguel de Allende 48: San Miguel de Allende leads by 3 points.
Shopping & style. Quito 40, San Miguel de Allende 55: San Miguel de Allende leads by 15 points.
Affordability. Quito 78, San Miguel de Allende 50: Quito leads by 28 points.
Live music & performing arts. Quito 38, San Miguel de Allende 40: San Miguel de Allende leads by 2 points.
Wellness & relaxation. Quito 44, San Miguel de Allende 66: San Miguel de Allende leads by 22 points.
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What lies behind each score is written up on the two cities’ own pages: Quito and San Miguel de Allende.

Your match

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

Too close to call, 2 points apart

Quito
50match

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

San Miguel de Allende
48match

Wins on day trips and wellness with your weighting.

What matters to you?

When should you go?

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

Quito in July

18 °Cdaytime high
5 °Cnight-time low
32 mmrain in the month
7 hsunshine a day
12 hdaylight a day

San Miguel de Allende in July

29 °Cdaytime high
14 °Cnight-time low
132 mmrain in the month
7 hsunshine a day
13 hdaylight a day

Daytime high, °C

0°10°20°30°40°JFMAMJJASOND

Rainfall in the month, mm

050100150200JFMAMJJASOND
QuitoSan Miguel de Allende

Where the figures come from

Quito's station stands 208 m above the city centre, so the centre is likely a little warmer than the figures say.

San Miguel de Allende's temperatures are measured 54 km from the centre, at Guanajuato, Gto..

San Miguel de Allende 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. Quito: 1961-1990 normals, Izobamba-Santa Catalina (16.8 km from centre). San Miguel de Allende: 1991-2020 normals, Guanajuato, Gto. (53.7 km from centre).

Before you go

MeasureQuitoSan Miguel de Allende
Official languageSpanish, Shuar, Northern QuichuaSpanish, Nahuatl, Yucatec Maya
CurrencyUS Dollar (USD)Mexican Peso (MXN)
SocketsAB120 V, 60 HzAB127 V, 60 Hz
Driving sideRightRight
Time zoneUTC-5UTC-6
Emergency number911911
Elevation2,850 m1,900 m
Main airportMariscal Sucre International Airport (UIO)20 km from centre22 non-stop destinationsGuanajuato International Airport (BJX)77 km from centre22 non-stop destinations
Public holidays this year11 days9 days

By the numbers

MeasureQuitoSan Miguel de Allende
City population1,763,27569,811
People per km²4,735-
Museums within 10 km162
UNESCO World Heritage sites within 50 km22

Where else could you go?

Every comparison below shares a destination with this one, so you can follow Quito or San Miguel de Allende 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. 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 2026-11-01. Daily budgets are estimates from country price levels.