VacationSelector
The County Courthouse and its garden, Santa Barbara
Santa BarbaraThe County Courthouse and its garden
Rice terraces and palms at Tegallalang, Ubud
UbudRice terraces and palms at Tegallalang

Photos: Santa Barbara by Warren LeMay, CC BY-SA 2.0, cropped; Ubud by Pinterpandai, CC BY-SA 3.0, cropped.

Santa Barbara or Ubud?

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 Santa Barbara for

  • getting around
  • beaches
  • nightlife

What lies behind each score is written up on Santa Barbara’s own page.

Choose Ubud for

  • prices
  • wellness
  • day trips

What lies behind each score is written up on Ubud’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. Santa Barbara 60, Ubud 38: Santa Barbara leads by 22 points.
Food & drink. Santa Barbara 62, Ubud 60: Santa Barbara leads by 2 points.
Culture & sights. Santa Barbara 48, Ubud 58: Ubud leads by 10 points.
Nightlife. Santa Barbara 34, Ubud 15: Santa Barbara leads by 19 points.
Nature & outdoors. Santa Barbara and Ubud are level on 80.
Day trips. Santa Barbara 55, Ubud 72: Ubud leads by 17 points.
Good for families. Santa Barbara 64, Ubud 48: Santa Barbara leads by 16 points.
Getting around. Santa Barbara 46, Ubud 10: Santa Barbara leads by 36 points.
Shopping & style. Santa Barbara 45, Ubud 52: Ubud leads by 7 points.
Affordability. Santa Barbara 15, Ubud 80: Ubud leads by 65 points.
Live music & performing arts. Santa Barbara 50, Ubud 47: Santa Barbara leads by 3 points.
Wellness & relaxation. Santa Barbara 50, Ubud 96: Ubud leads by 46 points.
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What lies behind each score is written up on the two cities’ own pages: Santa Barbara and Ubud.

Your match

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

Santa Barbara
51match

Wins on getting around and beaches with your weighting.

Ubud
Best match
55match

Wins on prices 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.

Santa Barbara in July

24 °Cdaytime high
14 °Cnight-time low
1 mmrain in the month
No recordsunshine a day
18 °Csea
14 hdaylight a day

Ubud in July

29 °Cdaytime high
24 °Cnight-time low
110 mmrain in the month
9 hsunshine a day
27 °Csea
12 hdaylight a day

Daytime high, °C

0°10°20°30°40°JFMAMJJASOND

Rainfall in the month, mm

0100200300JFMAMJJASOND
Santa BarbaraUbud

Where the figures come from

Ubud's temperatures are measured 29 km from the centre, at Denpasar / Ngurah-Rai.

Ubud's station stands 209 m below the city centre, so the centre is likely a little cooler than the figures say.

Ubud 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. Santa Barbara: 1991-2020 normals, Santa Barbara / La Patera (11.7 km from centre). Ubud: 1991-2020 normals, Denpasar / Ngurah-Rai (29 km from centre).

Before you go

MeasureSanta BarbaraUbud
Official language-Indonesian
CurrencyUS Dollar (USD)Rupiah (IDR)
SocketsAB120 V, 60 HzCF50 Hz
Driving sideRightLeft
Time zoneUTC-8, UTC-7 in summerUTC+8
Emergency number911112
Elevation15 m210 m
Main airportSanta Barbara Municipal Airport (SBA)12 km from centre13 non-stop destinationsDenpasar I Gusti Ngurah Rai International Airport (DPS)29 km from centre64 non-stop destinations
Public holidays this year13 days-

By the numbers

MeasureSanta BarbaraUbud
City population88,665-
People per km²816-
Museums within 10 km1014
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 Santa Barbara or Ubud 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 2026-11-02. Daily budgets are estimates from country price levels.