VacationSelector
The Golden Gate Bridge, San Francisco
San FranciscoThe Golden Gate Bridge
Cliff-top hotels above the harbour, Sorrento
SorrentoCliff-top hotels above the harbour

Photos: San Francisco by Elijah Cobb, Pexels License; Sorrento by Berthold Werner, CC BY-SA 3.0, cropped.

San Francisco or Sorrento?

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
  • nightlife

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

Choose Sorrento for

  • beaches
  • day trips
  • prices

What lies behind each score is written up on Sorrento’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, Sorrento 60: Sorrento leads by 35 points.
Food & drink. San Francisco 82, Sorrento 60: San Francisco leads by 22 points.
Culture & sights. San Francisco 68, Sorrento 32: San Francisco leads by 36 points.
Nightlife. San Francisco 58, Sorrento 28: San Francisco leads by 30 points.
Nature & outdoors. San Francisco and Sorrento are level on 80.
Day trips. San Francisco 72, Sorrento 95: Sorrento leads by 23 points.
Good for families. San Francisco 66, Sorrento 42: San Francisco leads by 24 points.
Getting around. San Francisco 70, Sorrento 58: San Francisco leads by 12 points.
Shopping & style. San Francisco 58, Sorrento 38: San Francisco leads by 20 points.
Affordability. San Francisco 14, Sorrento 32: Sorrento leads by 18 points.
Live music & performing arts. San Francisco 76, Sorrento 20: San Francisco leads by 56 points.
Wellness & relaxation. San Francisco 42, Sorrento 48: Sorrento leads by 6 points.
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What lies behind each score is written up on the two cities’ own pages: San Francisco and Sorrento.

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.

Sorrento
49match

Wins on beaches and day trips 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

Sorrento in July

29 °Cdaytime high
24 °Cnight-time low
21 mmrain in the month
11 hsunshine a day
25 °Csea
15 hdaylight a day

Daytime high, °C

0°10°20°30°JFMAMJJASOND

Rainfall in the month, mm

050100150200JFMAMJJASOND
San FranciscoSorrento

Where the figures come from

Sorrento 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.

Sorrento's sunshine is measured 54 km from the centre, at Grazzanise.

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). Sorrento: 2005-2025 (sunshine 1991-2020, rainfall 1991-2020) normals, Capri (17 km from centre).

Before you go

MeasureSan FranciscoSorrento
Official language-Italian
CurrencyUS Dollar (USD)Euro (EUR)
SocketsAB120 V, 60 HzCFL230 V, 50 Hz
Driving sideRightRight
Time zoneUTC-8, UTC-7 in summerUTC+1, UTC+2 in summer
Emergency number911112
Elevation16 m50 m
Main airportSan Francisco International Airport (SFO)18 km from centre142 non-stop destinationsNaples International Airport (NAP)30 km from centre131 non-stop destinations
Public holidays this year13 days13 days

By the numbers

MeasureSan FranciscoSorrento
City population873,96515,407
People per km²1,4551,541
Museums within 10 km516
UNESCO World Heritage sites within 50 km05
Swim season, months above 21 °CNone5 months

Where else could you go?

Every comparison below shares a destination with this one, so you can follow San Francisco or Sorrento 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. Tourism statistics from Eurostat, © European Union, reused under CC BY 4.0. 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 2026-10-31. Daily budgets are estimates from country price levels.