VacationSelector
The Golden Gate Bridge, San Francisco
San FranciscoThe Golden Gate Bridge
The main beach with the green hills behind, Sayulita
SayulitaThe main beach with the green hills behind

Photos: San Francisco by Elijah Cobb, Pexels License; Sayulita by Luisalvaz, CC BY-SA 4.0, cropped.

San Francisco or Sayulita?

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

  • live music and the arts
  • culture and sights
  • food and drink

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

Choose Sayulita for

  • beaches
  • prices
  • wellness

What lies behind each score is written up on Sayulita’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, Sayulita 80: Sayulita leads by 55 points.
Food & drink. San Francisco 82, Sayulita 42: San Francisco leads by 40 points.
Culture & sights. San Francisco 68, Sayulita 7: San Francisco leads by 61 points.
Nightlife. San Francisco 58, Sayulita 33: San Francisco leads by 25 points.
Nature & outdoors. San Francisco 80, Sayulita 72: San Francisco leads by 8 points.
Day trips. San Francisco 72, Sayulita 42: San Francisco leads by 30 points.
Good for families. San Francisco 66, Sayulita 42: San Francisco leads by 24 points.
Getting around. San Francisco 70, Sayulita 48: San Francisco leads by 22 points.
Shopping & style. San Francisco 58, Sayulita 33: San Francisco leads by 25 points.
Affordability. San Francisco 14, Sayulita 45: Sayulita leads by 31 points.
Live music & performing arts. San Francisco 76, Sayulita 12: San Francisco leads by 64 points.
Wellness & relaxation. San Francisco 42, Sayulita 58: Sayulita leads by 16 points.
0255075100

What lies behind each score is written up on the two cities’ own pages: San Francisco and Sayulita.

Your match

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

San Francisco
Best match
59match

Wins on live music and the arts and culture and sights with your weighting.

Sayulita
43match

Wins on beaches and prices 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
13 °Csea
15 hdaylight a day

Sayulita in July

29 °Cdaytime high
27 °Cnight-time low
342 mmrain in the month
30 °Csea
13 hdaylight a day

Daytime high, °C

0°10°20°30°JFMAMJJASOND

Rainfall in the month, mm

0100200300400JFMAMJJASOND
San FranciscoSayulita

Where the figures come from

Sayulita 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. San Francisco: 1981-2010 normals, Alameda Naval Air Station (9.1 km from centre). Sayulita: 2001-2020 normals, NASA POWER reanalysis grid, no weather station within 90 km.

Before you go

MeasureSan FranciscoSayulita
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 m2 m
Main airportSan Francisco International Airport (SFO)18 km from centre142 non-stop destinationsPuerto Vallarta International Airport (PVR)29 km from centre52 non-stop destinations
Public holidays this year13 days9 days

By the numbers

MeasureSan FranciscoSayulita
City population873,9653,390
People per km²1,455-
Museums within 10 km510
UNESCO World Heritage sites within 50 km01
Swim season, months above 21 °CNone12 months

Where else could you go?

Every comparison below shares a destination with this one, so you can follow San Francisco or Sayulita 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. Temperature and rainfall for destinations with no weather station are from the NASA POWER 2001-2020 climatology, derived from MERRA-2. 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 2026-11-02. Daily budgets are estimates from country price levels.