VacationSelector
The Colosseum, Rome
RomeThe Colosseum
The adobe New Mexico Museum of Art, Santa Fe
Santa FeThe adobe New Mexico Museum of Art

Photos: Rome by Tournasol7, CC BY-SA 4.0, cropped; Santa Fe by dconvertini, CC BY-SA 2.0, cropped.

Rome or Santa Fe?

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 Rome for

  • beaches
  • nightlife
  • culture and sights

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

Choose Santa Fe for

  • nature and the outdoors
  • wellness

What lies behind each score is written up on Santa Fe’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. Rome 50, Santa Fe 5: Rome leads by 45 points.
Food & drink. Rome 82, Santa Fe 62: Rome leads by 20 points.
Culture & sights. Rome 99, Santa Fe 66: Rome leads by 33 points.
Nightlife. Rome 58, Santa Fe 22: Rome leads by 36 points.
Nature & outdoors. Rome 58, Santa Fe 80: Santa Fe leads by 22 points.
Day trips. Rome 92, Santa Fe 70: Rome leads by 22 points.
Good for families. Rome 50, Santa Fe 45: Rome leads by 5 points.
Getting around. Rome 60, Santa Fe 40: Rome leads by 20 points.
Shopping & style. Rome 72, Santa Fe 62: Rome leads by 10 points.
Affordability. Rome 38, Santa Fe 30: Rome leads by 8 points.
Live music & performing arts. Rome 68, Santa Fe 55: Rome leads by 13 points.
Wellness & relaxation. Rome 40, Santa Fe 55: Santa Fe leads by 15 points.
0255075100

What lies behind each score is written up on the two cities’ own pages: Rome and Santa Fe.

Your match

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

Rome
Best match
64match

Wins on beaches and nightlife with your weighting.

Santa Fe
49match

Wins on nature and the outdoors 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.

Rome in July

31 °Cdaytime high
19 °Cnight-time low
21 mmrain in the month
11 hsunshine a day
25 °Csea
15 hdaylight a day

Santa Fe in July

31 °Cdaytime high
16 °Cnight-time low
60 mmrain in the month
No recordsunshine a day
No seasea
14 hdaylight a day

Daytime high, °C

0°10°20°30°40°JFMAMJJASOND

Rainfall in the month, mm

0255075100125JFMAMJJASOND
RomeSanta Fe

Where the figures come from

Rome's sunshine is measured 31 km from the centre, at Vigna Di Valle.

Santa Fe's station stands 199 m below the city centre, so the centre is likely a little cooler than the figures say.

Santa Fe 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. Rome: 1991-2020 normals, Roma / Ciampino (15.1 km from centre). Santa Fe: 1991-2020 normals, Santa Fe / Cieneguilla (12.4 km from centre).

Before you go

MeasureRomeSanta Fe
Official languageItalian-
CurrencyEuro (EUR)US Dollar (USD)
SocketsCFL230 V, 50 HzAB120 V, 60 Hz
Driving sideRightRight
Time zoneUTC+1, UTC+2 in summerUTC-7, UTC-6 in summer
Emergency number112911
Elevation21 m2,134 m
Main airportRome–Fiumicino Leonardo da Vinci International Airport (FCO)23 km from centre242 non-stop destinationsSanta Fe Municipal Airport (SAF)12 km from centre5 non-stop destinations
Public holidays this year13 days13 days

By the numbers

MeasureRomeSanta Fe
City population2,748,10987,505
People per km²2,135645
Museums within 10 km17810
UNESCO World Heritage sites within 50 km70
Swim season, months above 21 °C5 months-

Where else could you go?

Every comparison below shares a destination with this one, so you can follow Rome or Santa Fe 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. Sea surface temperature from NOAA OISST v2.1, NOAA Physical Sciences Laboratory. Airport data from OurAirports (public domain). Tourism statistics from Eurostat, © European Union, reused under CC BY 4.0. Public holidays from Nager.Date (MIT). 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. Exchange rates via Frankfurter, based on European Central Bank reference rates. 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.