San Jose or San Francisco?

Neither city is a beach destination, but the beaches are different. San Francisco's are inside the city: Ocean Beach runs for miles along the western edge, and Baker Beach looks straight at the Golden Gate Bridge. Both are windswept and often foggy, with dangerous currents, so people walk there, watch the sunset or light a bonfire rather than swim.

San Jose has no coast of its own. The trip over the mountains to Santa Cruz and Capitola takes about 45 minutes, and much longer on summer weekends. Those beaches are sunnier and more sheltered, with a real beach-town feel, but the water is still cold enough that most people paddle or surf in wetsuits.

San Francisco is far ahead here, and food alone is a good reason to stay in the city. You can pick up produce at the Ferry Building, eat dim sum in Chinatown and the Richmond, have pastries in North Beach, a burrito in the Mission and Dungeness crab in season, then book one of the best fine-dining restaurants in the country, all in neighbourhoods you can walk around.

San Jose's strength is narrower and more spread out. Its Vietnamese food, from pho to banh mi in Little Saigon and the east-side plazas, is excellent, and the Indian and Korean cooking towards Sunnyvale is worth the drive. But the best places are in strip malls rather than on walkable streets, and the downtown dining is polished but forgettable.

San Francisco gives you far more to see. It has landmarks known around the world, including Alcatraz, the cable cars and the painted Victorian houses, and several serious museums, from SFMOMA to the Legion of Honor. Neighbourhoods such as Chinatown, the Castro and the mural-covered Mission add a lot. It takes three or four days to do properly.

San Jose has a handful of oddities instead: the Winchester Mystery House with its staircases to nowhere, the Rosicrucian Egyptian Museum, and Mission Santa Clara from the Spanish colonial founding. The Computer History Museum in nearby Mountain View tells the Silicon Valley story. Beyond these the historic core is thin, and a couple of days covers it.

San Francisco is the city for a proper night out. You can choose between cocktail and mezcal bars along Valencia Street, the old saloons of North Beach, the Castro's busy gay bars and the warehouse clubs of SoMa, though last orders come at 2am.

San Jose's going out fits into a few downtown blocks: beer halls around San Pedro Square and dive bars in the SoFA district along South First Street. It is friendly and busy on Friday and Saturday, quiet the rest of the week and finished early. Locals who want a big night take the train north.

Both cities have real wilderness close by, but San Francisco's is more dramatic and easier to reach. The Lands End cliff trail, the Presidio woods and Golden Gate Park are all within the city. Across the bridge, the Marin Headlands, Muir Woods' redwoods and Mount Tamalpais are within half an hour, and you can sail or kayak on the bay itself.

San Jose's outdoors are in the hills around the valley. There are redwood groves at Big Basin and Henry Cowell, ridge trails at Castle Rock, road-cycling routes through the Santa Cruz Mountains, and sea otters and the headlands of Point Lobos on Monterey Bay. Nearly all of it needs a car, but the weather is warmer and drier than in foggy San Francisco.

San Jose has the better spread of day trips, partly because San Francisco itself is about an hour away by Caltrain. Stanford and Palo Alto are on its doorstep. Monterey, Carmel and the Santa Cruz boardwalk are noticeably closer than from San Francisco, and towns such as Los Gatos and Saratoga make easy half days.

San Francisco wins for wine country: Napa and Sonoma are about an hour north, compared with two hours or more from San Jose. It also has ferries to Sausalito and Tiburon and a quick train to Berkeley, but the southern coast takes longer to reach.

Both work for children, but in different ways. San Francisco is about hands-on museums and outings you can do on foot: a full day at the Exploratorium, the aquarium and rainforest at the California Academy of Sciences, a cable car ride and the sea lions at Fisherman's Wharf. The steep hills are hard work with a pushchair, though.

San Jose is for families who drive. It has the Great America theme park, the gentle Happy Hollow zoo, and day trips to the Santa Cruz Beach Boardwalk and the Monterey Bay Aquarium. Suburban hotels with pools and parking make the logistics easier, but expect a lot of time in the car.

San Francisco is far easier without a car. The city is about 11km across, and Muni, BART, the F-line streetcars, the cable cars and the ferries all work on one Clipper card. The only real effort is the steep climbs between neighbourhoods.

San Jose is built around freeways. The flat downtown is walkable, and light rail and Caltrain run along their own corridors, but the mansion, the malls, the foothill parks and the coast are spread across the valley. Most visitors end up hiring a car or using ride-hailing, and have to plan around rush hour.

San Francisco has more shopping with character. Beyond the department stores of Union Square, there are design boutiques in Hayes Valley, bookshops and independent labels on Valencia Street, and vintage shops in Haight-Ashbury, with Grant Avenue in Chinatown for tea and ceramics.

San Jose's shopping is mostly in its west-side malls, a very large regional mall and an open-air street next to it, where most international and luxury brands are in one place with easy parking. For anything independent you need the main streets of Los Gatos and Willow Glen.

Neither is a budget destination, but San Jose is a little easier on the wallet. Its hotels are priced for business travel, so weekend stays can cost noticeably less, though car hire, fuel and parking take back some of the saving.

San Francisco is harder going. Hotels are expensive throughout the centre and even more so during big conferences, and tax, service charges and tips are added to restaurant bills. On the other hand, you won't need a car, many of the best things to do, from walking the bridge to the coastal trails, are free, and some museums have free days.

On a typical evening in San Francisco you might choose between the opera or the ballet at the War Memorial Opera House, the symphony at Davies Hall, serious drama at the American Conservatory Theater or a set at the SFJAZZ Center in Hayes Valley. The Fillmore still has its psychedelic-era rock history, and in summer there are free concerts in Stern Grove.

The same evening in San Jose might offer one option or none. Opera San José performs in the California Theatre, a restored 1920s movie palace, and the symphony and touring musicals share the Center for the Performing Arts. San Jose does best with big arena concerts and the summer jazz festival in the downtown streets. Anyone who wants a full programme takes the train north.

San Francisco makes slowing down easier because its calm places are inside the city. A bus or streetcar takes you to Japantown for a long soak in the Japanese-style bathhouse, and from there it is a short ride to a quiet hour in the Tea Garden in Golden Gate Park. Calistoga's mud baths and mineral springs, at the top of Napa Valley, make a restful day out. The one drawback is downtown, which moves at the pace of the tech economy.

In San Jose you have to drive to unwind. The saunas and soaking pools are in Korean-style bathhouses out in the valley towns, and most of the pampering happens in hotel spas. The quietest settings, the Hakone gardens and the leafy streets of Los Gatos and Saratoga, are in the hills at the edge of the sprawl, and only the Japanese Friendship Garden at Kelley Park is in the city itself. Calistoga is well over two hours away, which is too far for an easy spa day.