VacationSelector
The adobe New Mexico Museum of Art, Santa Fe
Santa FeThe adobe New Mexico Museum of Art
The Riverwalk and the Cape Fear Memorial Bridge, Wilmington
WilmingtonThe Riverwalk and the Cape Fear Memorial Bridge

Photos: Santa Fe by dconvertini, CC BY-SA 2.0, cropped; Wilmington by Unexpected Snacks, CC BY-SA 4.0, cropped.

Santa Fe or Wilmington?

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 Fe for

  • shopping
  • culture and sights
  • day trips

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

Choose Wilmington for

  • beaches
  • nightlife
  • families

What lies behind each score is written up on Wilmington’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 Fe 5, Wilmington 73: Wilmington leads by 68 points.
Food & drink. Santa Fe 62, Wilmington 48: Santa Fe leads by 14 points.
Culture & sights. Santa Fe 66, Wilmington 40: Santa Fe leads by 26 points.
Nightlife. Santa Fe 22, Wilmington 40: Wilmington leads by 18 points.
Nature & outdoors. Santa Fe 80, Wilmington 58: Santa Fe leads by 22 points.
Day trips. Santa Fe 70, Wilmington 45: Santa Fe leads by 25 points.
Good for families. Santa Fe 45, Wilmington 62: Wilmington leads by 17 points.
Getting around. Santa Fe 40, Wilmington 28: Santa Fe leads by 12 points.
Shopping & style. Santa Fe 62, Wilmington 33: Santa Fe leads by 29 points.
Affordability. Santa Fe 30, Wilmington 42: Wilmington leads by 12 points.
Live music & performing arts. Santa Fe 55, Wilmington 40: Santa Fe leads by 15 points.
Wellness & relaxation. Santa Fe 55, Wilmington 33: Santa Fe leads by 22 points.
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What lies behind each score is written up on the two cities’ own pages: Santa Fe and Wilmington.

Your match

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

Santa Fe
Best match
49match

Wins on shopping and culture and sights with your weighting.

Wilmington
45match

Wins on beaches and nightlife with your weighting.

What matters to you?

When should you go?

Pick your month. The climate figures are measured averages, not a forecast.

Santa Fe in July

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

Wilmington in July

32 °Cdaytime high
23 °Cnight-time low
174 mmrain in the month
10 hsunshine a day
27 °Csea
14 hdaylight a day

Daytime high, °C

0°10°20°30°40°JFMAMJJASOND

Rainfall in the month, mm

050100150200250JFMAMJJASOND
Santa FeWilmington

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. Santa Fe: 1991-2020 normals, Santa Fe / Cieneguilla (12.4 km from centre). Wilmington: 1991-2020 normals, Wilmington / The Palms Mobile Home Park (5.3 km from centre).

Before you go

MeasureSanta FeWilmington
CurrencyUS Dollar (USD)US Dollar (USD)
SocketsAB120 V, 60 HzAB120 V, 60 Hz
Driving sideRightRight
Time zoneUTC-7, UTC-6 in summerUTC-5, UTC-4 in summer
Emergency number911911
Elevation2,134 m9 m
Main airportSanta Fe Municipal Airport (SAF)12 km from centre5 non-stop destinationsWilmington International Airport (ILM)5 km from centre25 non-stop destinations
Public holidays this year13 days14 days

By the numbers

MeasureSanta FeWilmington
City population87,505115,451
People per km²645839
Museums within 10 km102
UNESCO World Heritage sites within 50 km00
Swim season, months above 21 °C-6 months

Where else could you go?

Every comparison below shares a destination with this one, so you can follow Santa Fe or Wilmington 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. 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. Sea surface temperature from NOAA OISST v2.1, NOAA Physical Sciences Laboratory. 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.