VacationSelector
Hanok houses in Bukchon, Seoul
SeoulHanok houses in Bukchon
Stortorget in Gamla stan, Stockholm
StockholmStortorget in Gamla stan

Photos: Seoul by 거열 박, Pexels License; Stockholm by Jorge Franganillo, CC BY 2.0, cropped.

Seoul or Stockholm?

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 Seoul for

  • nightlife
  • food and drink
  • prices

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

Choose Stockholm for

  • beaches
  • culture and sights
  • families

What lies behind each score is written up on Stockholm’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. Seoul 18, Stockholm 40: Stockholm leads by 22 points.
Food & drink. Seoul 84, Stockholm 64: Seoul leads by 20 points.
Culture & sights. Seoul 75, Stockholm 77: Stockholm leads by 2 points.
Nightlife. Seoul 84, Stockholm 57: Seoul leads by 27 points.
Nature & outdoors. Seoul 75, Stockholm 72: Seoul leads by 3 points.
Day trips. Seoul 77, Stockholm 68: Seoul leads by 9 points.
Good for families. Seoul 80, Stockholm 82: Stockholm leads by 2 points.
Getting around. Seoul 87, Stockholm 84: Seoul leads by 3 points.
Shopping & style. Seoul 85, Stockholm 70: Seoul leads by 15 points.
Affordability. Seoul 50, Stockholm 30: Seoul leads by 20 points.
Live music & performing arts. Seoul 63, Stockholm 65: Stockholm leads by 2 points.
Wellness & relaxation. Seoul 75, Stockholm 56: Seoul leads by 19 points.
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What lies behind each score is written up on the two cities’ own pages: Seoul and Stockholm.

Your match

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

Seoul
Best match
71match

Wins on nightlife and food and drink with your weighting.

Stockholm
64match

Wins on beaches and culture and sights with your weighting.

What matters to you?

When should you go?

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

Seoul in July

29 °Cdaytime high
22 °Cnight-time low
422 mmrain in the month
4 hsunshine a day
21 °Csea
15 hdaylight a day

Stockholm in July

23 °Cdaytime high
14 °Cnight-time low
65 mmrain in the month
9 hsunshine a day
16 °Csea
18 hdaylight a day

Daytime high, °C

0°10°20°30°JFMAMJJASOND

Rainfall in the month, mm

0100200300400500JFMAMJJASOND
SeoulStockholm

Where the figures come from

Stockholm 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.

Stockholm's sunshine is measured 26 km from the centre, at Stockholm Observatoriet.

Temperature and rainfall are climate normals, averaged over the years shown. Seoul: 1991-2020 normals, Seoul (2.2 km from centre). Stockholm: 2003-2020 (sunshine 1991-2020, rainfall 1991-2020) normals, Stockholm Bromma Airport (7.1 km from centre).

Before you go

MeasureSeoulStockholm
Official languageKorean, Korean Sign LanguageSwedish
CurrencyWon (KRW)Swedish Krona (SEK)
SocketsCF220 V, 60 HzCF230 V, 50 Hz
Driving sideRightRight
Time zoneUTC+9UTC+1, UTC+2 in summer
Emergency numberPolice 112, ambulance 119, fire 119112
Elevation38 m22 m
Main airportIncheon International Airport (ICN)49 km from centre162 non-stop destinationsStockholm-Arlanda Airport (ARN)36 km from centre174 non-stop destinations
Public holidays this year18 days16 days

By the numbers

MeasureSeoulStockholm
City population9,668,465984,748
People per km²15,9735,260
Museums within 10 km81266
UNESCO World Heritage sites within 50 km53
Swim season, months above 21 °C2 monthsNone

Where else could you go?

Every comparison below shares a destination with this one, so you can follow Seoul or Stockholm 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. Ground elevations sampled from the Mapzen terrain tiles via OpenTopoData, merging SRTM, ASTER, NED, EU-DEM and national sources. Tourism statistics from Eurostat, © European Union, reused under CC BY 4.0. 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 2026-10-31. Daily budgets are estimates from country price levels.