VacationSelector
Bell Rock outside Sedona, Sedona
SedonaBell Rock outside Sedona
The beach and the oceanfront hotels from the fishing pier, Virginia Beach
Virginia BeachThe beach and the oceanfront hotels from the fishing pier

Photos: Sedona by dconvertini, CC BY-SA 2.0, cropped; Virginia Beach by SchuminWeb, CC BY-SA 3.0, cropped.

Sedona or Virginia Beach?

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 Sedona for

  • wellness
  • nature and the outdoors
  • shopping

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

Choose Virginia Beach for

  • beaches
  • families
  • nightlife

What lies behind each score is written up on Virginia Beach’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. Sedona 16, Virginia Beach 77: Virginia Beach leads by 61 points.
Food & drink. Sedona 33, Virginia Beach 42: Virginia Beach leads by 9 points.
Culture & sights. Sedona 20, Virginia Beach 30: Virginia Beach leads by 10 points.
Nightlife. Sedona 8, Virginia Beach 37: Virginia Beach leads by 29 points.
Nature & outdoors. Sedona 93, Virginia Beach 56: Sedona leads by 37 points.
Day trips. Sedona 55, Virginia Beach 64: Virginia Beach leads by 9 points.
Good for families. Sedona 42, Virginia Beach 75: Virginia Beach leads by 33 points.
Getting around. Sedona 22, Virginia Beach 27: Virginia Beach leads by 5 points.
Shopping & style. Sedona 34, Virginia Beach 32: Sedona leads by 2 points.
Affordability. Sedona 18, Virginia Beach 40: Virginia Beach leads by 22 points.
Live music & performing arts. Sedona 13, Virginia Beach 38: Virginia Beach leads by 25 points.
Wellness & relaxation. Sedona 82, Virginia Beach 32: Sedona leads by 50 points.
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What lies behind each score is written up on the two cities’ own pages: Sedona and Virginia Beach.

Your match

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

Sedona
36match

Wins on wellness and nature and the outdoors with your weighting.

Virginia Beach
Best match
46match

Wins on beaches and families with your weighting.

What matters to you?

When should you go?

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

Sedona in July

34 °Cdaytime high
21 °Cnight-time low
51 mmrain in the month
No seasea
14 hdaylight a day

Virginia Beach in July

31 °Cdaytime high
23 °Cnight-time low
152 mmrain in the month
25 °Csea
14 hdaylight a day

Daytime high, °C

0°10°20°30°40°JFMAMJJASOND

Rainfall in the month, mm

050100150200JFMAMJJASOND
SedonaVirginia Beach

Where the figures come from

Sedona's station stands 153 m above the city centre, so the centre is likely a little warmer than the figures say.

Sedona 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. Sedona: 2009-2025 (rainfall 1991-2020) normals, Sedona / West Sedona (1.3 km from centre). Virginia Beach: 1991-2020 normals, Virginia Beach / Gatewood Park (5.7 km from centre).

Before you go

MeasureSedonaVirginia Beach
CurrencyUS Dollar (USD)US Dollar (USD)
SocketsAB120 V, 60 HzAB120 V, 60 Hz
Driving sideRightRight
Time zoneUTC-7UTC-5, UTC-4 in summer
Emergency number911911
Elevation1,319 m7 m
Main airportPhoenix Sky Harbor International Airport (PHX)160 km from centre149 non-stop destinationsNorfolk International Airport (ORF)20 km from centre42 non-stop destinations
Public holidays this year12 days13 days

By the numbers

MeasureSedonaVirginia Beach
City population9,684459,470
People per km²195-
Museums within 10 km02
UNESCO World Heritage sites within 50 km00
Swim season, months above 21 °C-4 months

Where else could you go?

Every comparison below shares a destination with this one, so you can follow Sedona or Virginia Beach 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.