VacationSelector
Fishermen on the rocks at Playa Santa Teresa at sunset, Santa Teresa, Costa Rica
Santa Teresa, Costa RicaFishermen on the rocks at Playa Santa Teresa at sunset
The Arctic Cathedral, Tromso
TromsoThe Arctic Cathedral

Photos: Santa Teresa, Costa Rica by Christopher Crouzet, CC BY-SA 4.0, cropped; Tromso by Moyan Brenn, CC BY 2.0, cropped.

Santa Teresa, Costa Rica or Tromso?

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 Teresa, Costa Rica for

  • beaches
  • wellness
  • prices

What lies behind each score is written up on Santa Teresa, Costa Rica’s own page.

Choose Tromso for

  • getting around
  • live music and the arts
  • culture and sights

What lies behind each score is written up on Tromso’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 Teresa, Costa Rica 84, Tromso 8: Santa Teresa, Costa Rica leads by 76 points.
Food & drink. Santa Teresa, Costa Rica 40, Tromso 36: Santa Teresa, Costa Rica leads by 4 points.
Culture & sights. Santa Teresa, Costa Rica 4, Tromso 27: Tromso leads by 23 points.
Nightlife. Santa Teresa, Costa Rica 30, Tromso 38: Tromso leads by 8 points.
Nature & outdoors. Santa Teresa, Costa Rica 78, Tromso 92: Tromso leads by 14 points.
Day trips. Santa Teresa, Costa Rica 12, Tromso 14: Tromso leads by 2 points.
Good for families. Santa Teresa, Costa Rica 35, Tromso 45: Tromso leads by 10 points.
Getting around. Santa Teresa, Costa Rica 15, Tromso 60: Tromso leads by 45 points.
Shopping & style. Santa Teresa, Costa Rica 12, Tromso 15: Tromso leads by 3 points.
Affordability. Santa Teresa, Costa Rica 25, Tromso 11: Santa Teresa, Costa Rica leads by 14 points.
Live music & performing arts. Santa Teresa, Costa Rica 8, Tromso 32: Tromso leads by 24 points.
Wellness & relaxation. Santa Teresa, Costa Rica 70, Tromso 38: Santa Teresa, Costa Rica leads by 32 points.
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What lies behind each score is written up on the two cities’ own pages: Santa Teresa, Costa Rica and Tromso.

Your match

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

Too close to call, 1 point apart

Santa Teresa, Costa Rica
34match

Wins on beaches and wellness with your weighting.

Tromso
35match

Wins on getting around and live music and the arts with your weighting.

What matters to you?

When should you go?

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

Santa Teresa, Costa Rica in July

33 °Cdaytime high
23 °Cnight-time low
218 mmrain in the month
5 hsunshine a day
29 °Csea
13 hdaylight a day

Tromso in July

16 °Cdaytime high
9 °Cnight-time low
73 mmrain in the month
8 hsunshine a day
10 °Csea
24 hdaylight a day

Daytime high, °C

-10°0°10°20°30°40°JFMAMJJASOND

Rainfall in the month, mm

0100200300400500JFMAMJJASOND
Santa Teresa, Costa RicaTromso

Where the figures come from

Santa Teresa, Costa Rica's temperatures are measured 52 km from the centre, at Puntarenas.

Santa Teresa, Costa Rica 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 Teresa, Costa Rica: 1961-1990 (rainfall 1991-2020) normals, Puntarenas (51.5 km from centre). Tromso: 1991-2020 normals, Tromso (0.9 km from centre).

Before you go

MeasureSanta Teresa, Costa RicaTromso
Official languageSpanishNorwegian, Nynorsk, Bokmål, Sámi
CurrencyCosta Rican Colon (CRC)Norwegian Krone (NOK)
SocketsAB120 V, 60 HzCF230 V, 50 Hz
Driving sideRightRight
Time zoneUTC-6UTC+1, UTC+2 in summer
Emergency number911Police 112, ambulance 113, fire 110
Elevation19 m20 m
Main airportDaniel Oduber Quirós International Airport (LIR)113 km from centre30 non-stop destinationsTromsø Airport (TOS)4 km from centre49 non-stop destinations
Public holidays this year11 days13 days

By the numbers

MeasureSanta Teresa, Costa RicaTromso
City population-79,943
People per km²-32
Museums within 10 km08
UNESCO World Heritage sites within 50 km00
Swim season, months above 21 °C12 monthsNone

Where else could you go?

Every comparison below shares a destination with this one, so you can follow Santa Teresa, Costa Rica or Tromso somewhere new.

Browse every destination

Sources

Ground elevations sampled from the Mapzen terrain tiles via OpenTopoData, merging SRTM, ASTER, NED, EU-DEM and national 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). 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. Tourism statistics from Eurostat, © European Union, reused under CC BY 4.0. Exchange rates via Frankfurter, based on European Central Bank reference rates. 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.