VacationSelector
The Golden Gate Bridge, San Francisco
San FranciscoThe Golden Gate Bridge
El Castillo above the beach at Tulum, Tulum
TulumEl Castillo above the beach at Tulum

Photos: San Francisco by Elijah Cobb, Pexels License; Tulum by Bjørn Christian Tørrissen, CC BY-SA 3.0, cropped.

San Francisco or Tulum?

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
  • getting around
  • culture and sights

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

Choose Tulum for

  • beaches
  • wellness
  • prices

What lies behind each score is written up on Tulum’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, Tulum 88: Tulum leads by 63 points.
Food & drink. San Francisco 82, Tulum 52: San Francisco leads by 30 points.
Culture & sights. San Francisco 68, Tulum 30: San Francisco leads by 38 points.
Nightlife. San Francisco 58, Tulum 60: Tulum leads by 2 points.
Nature & outdoors. San Francisco 80, Tulum 76: San Francisco leads by 4 points.
Day trips. San Francisco 72, Tulum 68: San Francisco leads by 4 points.
Good for families. San Francisco 66, Tulum 60: San Francisco leads by 6 points.
Getting around. San Francisco 70, Tulum 25: San Francisco leads by 45 points.
Shopping & style. San Francisco 58, Tulum 35: San Francisco leads by 23 points.
Affordability. San Francisco 14, Tulum 30: Tulum leads by 16 points.
Live music & performing arts. San Francisco 76, Tulum 15: San Francisco leads by 61 points.
Wellness & relaxation. San Francisco 42, Tulum 85: Tulum leads by 43 points.
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What lies behind each score is written up on the two cities’ own pages: San Francisco and Tulum.

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 getting around with your weighting.

Tulum
52match

Wins on beaches 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
13 °Csea
15 hdaylight a day

Tulum in July

30 °Cdaytime high
26 °Cnight-time low
116 mmrain in the month
29 °Csea
13 hdaylight a day

Daytime high, °C

0°10°20°30°40°JFMAMJJASOND

Rainfall in the month, mm

050100150200250JFMAMJJASOND
San FranciscoTulum

Where the figures come from

Tulum 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). Tulum: 2001-2020 normals, NASA POWER reanalysis grid, no weather station within 90 km.

Before you go

MeasureSan FranciscoTulum
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-5
Emergency number911911
Elevation16 m5 m
Main airportSan Francisco International Airport (SFO)18 km from centre142 non-stop destinationsFelipe Carrillo Puerto International Airport Tulum (TQO)21 km from centre11 non-stop destinations
Public holidays this year13 days9 days

By the numbers

MeasureSan FranciscoTulum
City population873,96533,374
People per km²1,455-
Museums within 10 km510
UNESCO World Heritage sites within 50 km00
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 Tulum 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 2026-10-31. Daily budgets are estimates from country price levels.