VacationSelector
The Winchester Mystery House, San Jose
San JoseThe Winchester Mystery House
The adobe New Mexico Museum of Art, Santa Fe
Santa FeThe adobe New Mexico Museum of Art

Photos: San Jose by Roxanna Salceda, CC BY-SA 2.0, cropped; Santa Fe by dconvertini, CC BY-SA 2.0, cropped.

San Jose or Santa Fe?

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 Jose for

  • beaches
  • families
  • nightlife

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

Choose Santa Fe for

  • culture and sights
  • wellness
  • live music and the arts

What lies behind each score is written up on Santa Fe’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 Jose 30, Santa Fe 5: San Jose leads by 25 points.
Food & drink. San Jose 56, Santa Fe 62: Santa Fe leads by 6 points.
Culture & sights. San Jose 36, Santa Fe 66: Santa Fe leads by 30 points.
Nightlife. San Jose 33, Santa Fe 22: San Jose leads by 11 points.
Nature & outdoors. San Jose 72, Santa Fe 80: Santa Fe leads by 8 points.
Day trips. San Jose 78, Santa Fe 70: San Jose leads by 8 points.
Good for families. San Jose 65, Santa Fe 45: San Jose leads by 20 points.
Getting around. San Jose 30, Santa Fe 40: Santa Fe leads by 10 points.
Shopping & style. San Jose 48, Santa Fe 62: Santa Fe leads by 14 points.
Affordability. San Jose 20, Santa Fe 30: Santa Fe leads by 10 points.
Live music & performing arts. San Jose 38, Santa Fe 55: Santa Fe leads by 17 points.
Wellness & relaxation. San Jose 30, Santa Fe 55: Santa Fe leads by 25 points.
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What lies behind each score is written up on the two cities’ own pages: San Jose and Santa Fe.

Your match

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

San Jose
45match

Wins on beaches and families with your weighting.

Santa Fe
Best match
49match

Wins on culture and sights 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 Jose in July

27 °Cdaytime high
15 °Cnight-time low
0 mmrain in the month
14 °Csea
15 hdaylight a day

Santa Fe in July

31 °Cdaytime high
16 °Cnight-time low
60 mmrain in the month
No seasea
14 hdaylight a day

Daytime high, °C

0°10°20°30°40°JFMAMJJASOND

Rainfall in the month, mm

020406080JFMAMJJASOND
San JoseSanta Fe

Where the figures come from

Santa Fe's station stands 199 m below the city centre, so the centre is likely a little cooler than the figures say.

Santa Fe 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 Jose: 1991-2020 normals, San Jose / Santa Clara Trailer Village (8.2 km from centre). Santa Fe: 1991-2020 normals, Santa Fe / Cieneguilla (12.4 km from centre).

Before you go

MeasureSan JoseSanta Fe
CurrencyUS Dollar (USD)US Dollar (USD)
SocketsAB120 V, 60 HzAB120 V, 60 Hz
Driving sideRightRight
Time zoneUTC-8, UTC-7 in summerUTC-7, UTC-6 in summer
Emergency number911911
Elevation25 m2,134 m
Main airportMineta San Jose International Airport (SJC)8 km from centre38 non-stop destinationsSanta Fe Municipal Airport (SAF)12 km from centre5 non-stop destinations
Public holidays this year13 days13 days

By the numbers

MeasureSan JoseSanta Fe
City population1,013,24087,505
People per km²2,167645
Museums within 10 km1910
UNESCO World Heritage sites within 50 km00
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 Jose or Santa Fe 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.