Rio de Janeiro or San Francisco?
Two destinations compared on nine measures of openly sourced data. Weight what matters to you and the verdict follows.
Your match
Wins on beaches & swimming and value for money with your weighting.
Wins on places to eat and nightlife with your weighting.
What matters to you?
Pick a travel style or drag the sliders. The match scores above update as you do.
Scoreboard
Each measure scored 0 to 100. Open a row for the figures behind the score.
Beaches & swimming. Rio de Janeiro leads by 40 points.40
| Rio de Janeiro | San Francisco | |
|---|---|---|
| Score | 100 | 60 |
| Swim season months | 12 | 0 |
| Beaches 10 km | 61 | 44 |
| Coast distance | 1 km | 2 km |
| Water distance | 1 km | 2 km |
Places to eat. San Francisco leads by 29 points.29
| Rio de Janeiro | San Francisco | |
|---|---|---|
| Score | 54 | 83 |
| Restaurants within 2 km of centre | 804 | 2,359 |
| Effective number of cuisines within 2 km | 16 | 39 |
Museums & heritage. Rio de Janeiro leads by 25 points.25
| Rio de Janeiro | San Francisco | |
|---|---|---|
| Score | 69 | 44 |
| Museums within 10 km | 110 | 57 |
| Museums within 2 km of centre | 51 | 29 |
| Share of museums within 2 km % | 46 | 51 |
| Unesco sites within 50 km | 3 | 0 |
Nightlife. San Francisco leads by 11 points.11
| Rio de Janeiro | San Francisco | |
|---|---|---|
| Score | 57 | 68 |
| Drinking venues within 4 km | 818 | 1,434 |
| Drinking venues within 2 km of centre | 509 | 928 |
| Share of drinking venues within 2 km % | 62 | 65 |
| Nightclubs within 4 km | 50 | 97 |
Nature & day trips. Rio de Janeiro leads by 2 points.2
| Rio de Janeiro | San Francisco | |
|---|---|---|
| Score | 62 | 60 |
| Protected land share 50 km % | 21 | 17 |
| Landscape blanket share 50 km % | 17 | 4 |
| Land share of disc % | 57 | 57 |
| Park area within 2 km | 113 hectares | 45 hectares |
Good for families. Rio de Janeiro leads by 2 points.2
| Rio de Janeiro | San Francisco | |
|---|---|---|
| Score | 59 | 57 |
| Tourist attractions within 2 km | 30 | 48 |
| Park area within 2 km | 113 hectares | 45 hectares |
| Theme parks within 30 km | 1 | 1 |
Sights concentration. San Francisco leads by 7 points.7
| Rio de Janeiro | San Francisco | |
|---|---|---|
| Score | 56 | 63 |
| Notable places within 2 km | 98 | 147 |
| Min wikipedia languages | 5 | 5 |
Value for money. Rio de Janeiro leads by 38 points.38
| Rio de Janeiro | San Francisco | |
|---|---|---|
| Score | 81 | 43 |
| Price level global | 46.1 | 100 |
| Daily budget | — | — |
Year-round weather. Rio de Janeiro leads by 7 points.7
| Rio de Janeiro | San Francisco | |
|---|---|---|
| Score | 85 | 78 |
| Monthly daytime high | 24 °C to 28.4 °C | 14 °C to 23.2 °C |
| Monthly rainfall | 42 mm to 232 mm | 0 mm to 105 mm |
| Dry months | 0 | 7 |
When should you go?
The figures behind each month. Each row is shaded against that destination's own year, so the deepest cell is its best month for that measure and the palest its weakest. Shades are not comparable between the two rows.
Temperature and rainfall are thirty-year climate normals, averaged over the years shown. Rio de Janeiro: 2001-2020 normals, NASA POWER reanalysis grid, no weather station within 90 km. San Francisco: 1981-2010 normals, Alameda Naval Air Station (9.1 km from centre).
Getting there
| Flying from | Rio de Janeiro | San Francisco |
|---|---|---|
| New YorkJFK, EWR, LGA | 9 h 45 m €609-699 2 stops GIG · 12 km | 5 h 35 m €286-328 1 stop SFO · 18 km |
| TorontoYYZ, YHM, YTZ | 10 h 25 m no fares GIG · 12 km | 4 h 55 m €339-541 1 stop SFO · 18 km |
| DallasDFW, DAL, AFW | 10 h 35 m no fares GIG · 12 km | 3 h 25 m no fares SFO · 18 km |
| FrankfurtFRA, HHN | 11 h 55 m €915-1205 2 stops GIG · 12 km | 11 h 25 m no fares SFO · 18 km |
| ParisCDG, ORY, BVA | 11 h 30 m €957-1014 2 stops GIG · 12 km | 11 h 15 m no fares SFO · 18 km |
| LondonLHR, LGW, STN, LTN +2 | 11 h 35 m €996-1109 2 stops GIG · 12 km | 10 h 50 m no fares SFO · 18 km |
| AtlantaATL, PDK | 9 h 40 m no fares GIG · 12 km | 4 h 40 m no fares SFO · 18 km |
| DubaiDXB, DWC | 14 h 40 m €1,154-1306 GIG · 12 km | 16 h 0 m €1,005-1027 1 stop SFO · 18 km |
| MadridMAD | 10 h 15 m €910-925 1 stop GIG · 12 km | 11 h 40 m no fares SFO · 18 km |
| AmsterdamAMS | 11 h 55 m €900-974 1 stop GIG · 12 km | 11 h 0 m no fares SFO · 18 km |
The busiest departure cities for these two, with a place kept for each other part of the world. Busiest means arriving passengers where an official count exists, and where none does, the number of non-stop services flown: official route statistics are published by the European reporting countries and by nobody else, so a table ranked on them alone would offer a reader in New York or Tokyo ten European cities. Flying times are estimated from the distance between airports, and every row is a city flown non-stop to both. Where the typical offer connects anyway, the stops are shown. Under each figure is the airport the flight lands at and how far that is from the centre, because the nearest airport is not always the one a route is flown to. Where both columns name the same airport it is one flight, and the difference between the two is the distance printed beside it. Typical return fares for 2026-09 to 2026-10, cached market data up to 7 days old. The figure is the middle half of the offers found, so a single price means they agreed and a range means they did not; for a typical route that middle half spans about a quarter of the median, and for the least settled routes rather more than the median itself.
Before you go
| Measure | Rio de Janeiro | San Francisco |
|---|---|---|
| Official language | Portuguese | – |
| Currency | Brazilian Real (BRL) | US Dollar (USD) |
| Sockets | CN60 Hz | AB120 V, 60 Hz |
| Driving side | Right | Right |
| Time zone | UTC-3 | UTC-8, UTC-7 in summer |
| Emergency number | Police 190, ambulance 192, fire 193 | 911 |
| Elevation | 31 m | 16 m |
| Main airport | Rio de Janeiro Galeão – Tom Jobim International Airport (GIG)12 km from centre59 non-stop destinations | San Francisco International Airport (SFO)18 km from centre142 non-stop destinations |
| Public holidays this year | 14 days | 13 days |
By the numbers
| Measure | Rio de Janeiro | San Francisco |
|---|---|---|
| City population | 6,211,223 | 873,965 |
| People per km² | 4,930 | 1,455 |
| Museums within 10 km | 70 | 50 |
| UNESCO World Heritage sites within 50 km | 3 | 0 |
| Distinct cuisines in the centre | 27 | 108 |
| Swim season, months above 21 °C | 12 months | None |
Where else could you go?
Every comparison below shares a destination with this one, so you can follow Rio de Janeiro or San Francisco somewhere new.