Siena or Venice?
Two destinations compared on nine measures of openly sourced data. Weight what matters to you and the verdict follows.
Your match
Wins on nature & day trips with your weighting.
Wins on beaches & swimming and sights concentration with your weighting.
What matters to you?
Pick a travel style or drag the sliders. The match scores above update as you do.
The verdict
Choose Siena if you want heritage in a small city: museums on a par with Venice's, more park space near the centre, and sights spread out rather than packed together.
Choose Venice if you want the coast, 20 beaches nearby and sea warm enough to swim in for four months, far more to see within walking distance of the centre, and more for children.
Scoreboard
Each measure scored 0 to 100. Open a row for the figures behind the score.
Beaches & swimming. Venice leads by 69 points.69
| Siena | Venice | |
|---|---|---|
| Score | 0 | 69 |
| Swim season months | 0 | 4 |
| Beaches 10 km | 0 | 20 |
| Coast distance | 64 km | 4 km |
| Water distance | — | 4 km |
Places to eat. Venice leads by 13 points.13
| Siena | Venice | |
|---|---|---|
| Score | 32 | 45 |
| Restaurants within 2 km of centre | 242 | 750 |
| Effective number of cuisines within 2 km | 11 | 10 |
Museums & heritage. Venice leads by 1 points.1
| Siena | Venice | |
|---|---|---|
| Score | 71 | 72 |
| Museums within 10 km | 55 | 57 |
| Museums within 2 km of centre | 51 | 45 |
| Share of museums within 2 km % | 93 | 79 |
| Unesco sites within 50 km | 5 | 5 |
Nightlife. Venice leads by 18 points.18
| Siena | Venice | |
|---|---|---|
| Score | 17 | 35 |
| Drinking venues within 4 km | 142 | 342 |
| Drinking venues within 2 km of centre | 119 | 306 |
| Share of drinking venues within 2 km % | 84 | 89 |
| Nightclubs within 4 km | 1 | 3 |
Nature & day trips. Siena leads by 2 points.2
| Siena | Venice | |
|---|---|---|
| Score | 19 | 17 |
| Protected land share 50 km % | 3 | 4 |
| Landscape blanket share 50 km % | 0 | 0 |
| Land share of disc % | 100 | 70 |
| Park area within 2 km | 29 hectares | 15 hectares |
Good for families. Venice leads by 26 points.26
| Siena | Venice | |
|---|---|---|
| Score | 31 | 57 |
| Tourist attractions within 2 km | 13 | 72 |
| Park area within 2 km | 29 hectares | 15 hectares |
| Theme parks within 30 km | 0 | 3 |
Sights concentration. Venice leads by 33 points.33
| Siena | Venice | |
|---|---|---|
| Score | 50 | 83 |
| Notable places within 2 km | 69 | 464 |
| Min wikipedia languages | 5 | 5 |
Value for money. Siena and Venice are level on 68.
| Siena | Venice | |
|---|---|---|
| Score | 68 | 68 |
| Price level global | 64.9 | 64.9 |
| Daily budget | €155 | €155 |
Year-round weather. Venice leads by 2 points.2
| Siena | Venice | |
|---|---|---|
| Score | 64 | 66 |
| Monthly daytime high | 8.9 °C to 31.3 °C | 8 °C to 30.4 °C |
| Monthly rainfall | 49 mm to 136 mm | 36 mm to 106 mm |
| Dry months | 0 | 2 |
Where they differ
Siena is the smaller place, about 52,800 people to Venice's 250,000, with roughly twice as much park space near the centre. Its notable buildings sit further apart, so sightseeing is a walk through a town rather than a dense circuit.
Venice has 20 beaches nearby and a sea reaching 26°C in August, where Siena has no coast at all. It has far more notable places within walking distance of the centre, and it suits children better, with 3 theme parks within reach and many more attractions near the centre.
Where they are alike
Both hold about the same number of museums, and each has 5 UNESCO-listed places within day-trip reach, so heritage is a reason to visit either.
Their weather follows a similar course, with daytime highs of about 9-31°C in both across the year. Neither is a base for countryside: protected land nearby runs to 3% around Siena and 4% around Venice, and day trips into open nature are limited either way.
Which traveller are you?
Families are better served in Venice: 3 theme parks within reach, far more attractions near the centre, and sea at 26°C in August. Siena's counterweight is park space near the centre, which suits a quieter trip with small children.
Heritage travellers can take either. The two hold a similar number of museums and each has 5 UNESCO-listed places within day-trip reach; Siena spreads its sights out, Venice concentrates far more within walking distance of the centre.
Anyone travelling for meals and evenings should pick Venice, with about three times as many restaurants near the centre and twice as many places to drink, most of them central. Siena is the quieter city after dark.
What the numbers don't tell you
The value figure is a national price level applied to both, identical by construction, so it tells you nothing about how these two cities compare on cost. The €155 daily budget beside it is one national estimate, not a measurement of either place.
No weather station near Siena records sunshine hours, so that series is missing rather than low, and its monthly picture rests on temperature and rainfall alone; sunshine cannot be compared here. Venice's warm sea and dense centre also peak in the months that draw the most visitors, and September, strong in both, is the wettest month of the year in each, above 100mm.
When should you go?
The figures behind each month. Each row is shaded against that destination's own year, so the deepest cell is its best month for that measure and the palest its weakest. Shades are not comparable between the two rows.
Temperature and rainfall are thirty-year climate normals, averaged over the years shown. Siena: 2006-2017 (rainfall 1991-2020) normals, Arezzo (45 km from centre). Venice: 1991-2020 normals, Treviso / S. Angelo (26.1 km from centre).
Siena is at its best in June, 28°C with 71mm of rain, and again in September, 26°C but wetter at 103mm. May is warm at 23°C and takes 99mm.
Venice holds up from May to July, 24-30°C, with July the driest of that run at 65mm, and the sea reaches 26°C in August. Its winters are drier too, 38mm in January against 71mm in Siena, though neither city is warm then.
Getting there
| Flying from | Siena | Venice |
|---|---|---|
| ParisCDG, ORY, BVA | 1 h 40 m €143-159 FLR · 55 km | 1 h 40 m €68-109 VCE · 7 km |
| LondonLHR, LGW, STN, LTN +2 | 2 h 5 m €180-199 1 stop FLR · 55 km | 2 h 0 m €46-119 1 stop VCE · 7 km |
| TiranaTIA | 1 h 35 m no fares PSA · 86 km | 1 h 35 m €23-126 TSF · 26 km |
| AmsterdamAMS | 1 h 55 m €232-255 2 stops FLR · 55 km | 1 h 45 m €190-215 1 stop VCE · 7 km |
| BarcelonaBCN | 1 h 35 m €113-168 FLR · 55 km | 1 h 45 m €41-56 VCE · 7 km |
| MadridMAD | 2 h 10 m no fares FLR · 55 km | 2 h 20 m €102-159 VCE · 7 km |
| RomeFCO, CIA | 55 m €136-139 1 stop FLR · 55 km | 1 h 10 m €81-119 VCE · 7 km |
| FrankfurtFRA, HHN | 1 h 30 m no fares FLR · 55 km | 1 h 20 m €136-186 1 stop VCE · 7 km |
| MunichMUC | 1 h 15 m no fares FLR · 55 km | 1 h 5 m €268-289 VCE · 7 km |
| DubaiDXB, DWC | 5 h 55 m no fares BLQ · 135 km | 5 h 55 m €366-421 2 stops VCE · 7 km |
The busiest departure cities for these two, with a place kept for each other part of the world. Busiest means arriving passengers where an official count exists, and where none does, the number of non-stop services flown: official route statistics are published by the European reporting countries and by nobody else, so a table ranked on them alone would offer a reader in New York or Tokyo ten European cities. Flying times are estimated from the distance between airports, and every row is a city flown non-stop to both. Where the typical offer connects anyway, the stops are shown. Under each figure is the airport the flight lands at and how far that is from the centre, because the nearest airport is not always the one a route is flown to. Where both columns name the same airport it is one flight, and the difference between the two is the distance printed beside it. Typical return fares for 2026-08 to 2026-10, cached market data up to 7 days old. The figure is the middle half of the offers found, so a single price means they agreed and a range means they did not; for a typical route that middle half spans about a quarter of the median, and for the least settled routes rather more than the median itself.
Before you go
| Measure | Siena | Venice |
|---|---|---|
| Official language | Italian | Italian |
| Currency | Euro (EUR) | Euro (EUR) |
| Sockets | CFL230 V, 50 Hz | CFL230 V, 50 Hz |
| Driving side | Right | Right |
| Time zone | UTC+1, UTC+2 in summer | UTC+1, UTC+2 in summer |
| Emergency number | 112 | 112 |
| Elevation | 322 m | 2 m |
| Main airport | Florence Airport, Peretola (FLR)55 km from centre36 non-stop destinations | Venice Marco Polo Airport (VCE)7 km from centre98 non-stop destinations |
| Public holidays this year | 13 days | 13 days |
By the numbers
| Measure | Siena | Venice |
|---|---|---|
| City population | 52,812 | 250,369 |
| People per km² | 446 | 602 |
| Museums within 10 km | 29 | 52 |
| UNESCO World Heritage sites within 50 km | 5 | 5 |
| Distinct cuisines in the centre | 25 | 46 |
| 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 Siena or Venice somewhere new.