VacationSelector
The pink Don CeSar hotel seen from the beach, St. Pete Beach
St. Pete BeachThe pink Don CeSar hotel seen from the beach
The US Capitol, Washington DC
Washington DCThe US Capitol

Photos: St. Pete Beach by Jeffrey Eisen, Pexels License; Washington DC by Guohua Song, Pexels License.

St. Pete Beach or Washington DC?

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 St. Pete Beach for

  • beaches
  • wellness
  • prices

What lies behind each score is written up on St. Pete Beach’s own page.

Choose Washington DC for

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

What lies behind each score is written up on Washington DC’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. St. Pete Beach 87, Washington DC 12: St. Pete Beach leads by 75 points.
Food & drink. St. Pete Beach 40, Washington DC 67: Washington DC leads by 27 points.
Culture & sights. St. Pete Beach 18, Washington DC 84: Washington DC leads by 66 points.
Nightlife. St. Pete Beach 28, Washington DC 57: Washington DC leads by 29 points.
Nature & outdoors. St. Pete Beach 57, Washington DC 64: Washington DC leads by 7 points.
Day trips. St. Pete Beach 58, Washington DC 73: Washington DC leads by 15 points.
Good for families. St. Pete Beach 72, Washington DC 73: Washington DC leads by 1 points.
Getting around. St. Pete Beach 30, Washington DC 72: Washington DC leads by 42 points.
Shopping & style. St. Pete Beach 20, Washington DC 52: Washington DC leads by 32 points.
Affordability. St. Pete Beach 32, Washington DC 28: St. Pete Beach leads by 4 points.
Live music & performing arts. St. Pete Beach 20, Washington DC 67: Washington DC leads by 47 points.
Wellness & relaxation. St. Pete Beach 42, Washington DC 26: St. Pete Beach leads by 16 points.
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What lies behind each score is written up on the two cities’ own pages: St. Pete Beach and Washington DC.

Your match

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

St. Pete Beach
42match

Wins on beaches and wellness with your weighting.

Washington DC
Best match
56match

Wins on culture and sights 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.

St. Pete Beach in July

32 °Cdaytime high
26 °Cnight-time low
185 mmrain in the month
9 hsunshine a day
30 °Csea
14 hdaylight a day

Washington DC in July

32 °Cdaytime high
22 °Cnight-time low
108 mmrain in the month
No recordsunshine a day
25 °Csea
15 hdaylight a day

Daytime high, °C

0°10°20°30°40°JFMAMJJASOND

Rainfall in the month, mm

050100150200250JFMAMJJASOND
St. Pete BeachWashington DC

Where the figures come from

St. Pete Beach 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.

St. Pete Beach's sunshine is measured 34 km from the centre, at Tampa International Airport.

Temperature and rainfall are climate normals, averaged over the years shown. St. Pete Beach: 1998-2020 (sunshine 1991-2020, rainfall 1991-2020) normals, Saint Petersburg (12.2 km from centre). Washington DC: 1991-2020 normals, Washington National Airport (5 km from centre).

Before you go

MeasureSt. Pete BeachWashington DC
CurrencyUS Dollar (USD)US Dollar (USD)
SocketsAB120 V, 60 HzAB120 V, 60 Hz
Driving sideRightRight
Time zoneUTC-5, UTC-4 in summerUTC-5, UTC-4 in summer
Emergency number911911
Elevation2 m72 m
Main airportSt. Petersburg Clearwater International Airport (PIE)21 km from centre60 non-stop destinationsRonald Reagan Washington National Airport (DCA)5 km from centre105 non-stop destinations
Public holidays this year11 days11 days

By the numbers

MeasureSt. Pete BeachWashington DC
City population8,879689,545
People per km²1733,896
Museums within 10 km298
UNESCO World Heritage sites within 50 km00
Swim season, months above 21 °C8 months3 months

Where else could you go?

Every comparison below shares a destination with this one, so you can follow St. Pete Beach or Washington DC 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. 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.