VacationSelector
The Golden Gate Bridge, San Francisco
San FranciscoThe Golden Gate Bridge
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: San Francisco by Elijah Cobb, Pexels License; San Miguel de Allende by Russ Bowling, CC BY 2.0, cropped.

San Francisco 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 San Francisco for

  • nature and the outdoors
  • live music and the arts
  • families

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

Choose San Miguel de Allende for

  • prices
  • wellness
  • day trips

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. San Francisco 25, San Miguel de Allende 4: San Francisco leads by 21 points.
Food & drink. San Francisco 82, San Miguel de Allende 62: San Francisco leads by 20 points.
Culture & sights. San Francisco 68, San Miguel de Allende 62: San Francisco leads by 6 points.
Nightlife. San Francisco 58, San Miguel de Allende 38: San Francisco leads by 20 points.
Nature & outdoors. San Francisco 80, San Miguel de Allende 40: San Francisco leads by 40 points.
Day trips. San Francisco 72, San Miguel de Allende 77: San Miguel de Allende leads by 5 points.
Good for families. San Francisco 66, San Miguel de Allende 32: San Francisco leads by 34 points.
Getting around. San Francisco 70, San Miguel de Allende 48: San Francisco leads by 22 points.
Shopping & style. San Francisco 58, San Miguel de Allende 55: San Francisco leads by 3 points.
Affordability. San Francisco 14, San Miguel de Allende 50: San Miguel de Allende leads by 36 points.
Live music & performing arts. San Francisco 76, San Miguel de Allende 40: San Francisco leads by 36 points.
Wellness & relaxation. San Francisco 42, San Miguel de Allende 66: San Miguel de Allende leads by 24 points.
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What lies behind each score is written up on the two cities’ own pages: San Francisco and San Miguel de Allende.

Your match

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

San Francisco
Best match
59match

Wins on nature and the outdoors and live music and the arts with your weighting.

San Miguel de Allende
48match

Wins on prices 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.

San Francisco in July

22 °Cdaytime high
14 °Cnight-time low
0 mmrain in the month
No recordsunshine a day
13 °Csea
15 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
No seasea
13 hdaylight a day

Daytime high, °C

0°10°20°30°40°JFMAMJJASOND

Rainfall in the month, mm

050100150JFMAMJJASOND
San FranciscoSan Miguel de Allende

Where the figures come from

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. San Francisco: 1981-2010 normals, Alameda Naval Air Station (9.1 km from centre). San Miguel de Allende: 1991-2020 normals, Guanajuato, Gto. (53.7 km from centre).

Before you go

MeasureSan FranciscoSan Miguel de Allende
Official language-Spanish, Nahuatl, Yucatec Maya
CurrencyUS Dollar (USD)Mexican Peso (MXN)
SocketsAB120 V, 60 HzAB127 V, 60 Hz
Driving sideRightRight
Time zoneUTC-8, UTC-7 in summerUTC-6
Emergency number911911
Elevation16 m1,900 m
Main airportSan Francisco International Airport (SFO)18 km from centre142 non-stop destinationsGuanajuato International Airport (BJX)77 km from centre22 non-stop destinations
Public holidays this year13 days9 days

By the numbers

MeasureSan FranciscoSan Miguel de Allende
City population873,96569,811
People per km²1,455-
Museums within 10 km512
UNESCO World Heritage sites within 50 km02
Swim season, months above 21 °CNone-

Where else could you go?

Every comparison below shares a destination with this one, so you can follow San Francisco 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. 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. 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.