VacationSelector
The old railway depot in the snow, Steamboat Springs
Steamboat SpringsThe old railway depot in the snow
The beach and the oceanfront hotels from the fishing pier, Virginia Beach
Virginia BeachThe beach and the oceanfront hotels from the fishing pier

Photos: Steamboat Springs by Jeffrey Beall, CC BY-SA 3.0, cropped; Virginia Beach by SchuminWeb, CC BY-SA 3.0, cropped.

Steamboat Springs 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 Steamboat Springs for

  • wellness
  • nature and the outdoors
  • getting around

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

Choose Virginia Beach for

  • beaches
  • day trips
  • prices

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. Steamboat Springs 7, Virginia Beach 77: Virginia Beach leads by 70 points.
Food & drink. Steamboat Springs 30, Virginia Beach 42: Virginia Beach leads by 12 points.
Culture & sights. Steamboat Springs 14, Virginia Beach 30: Virginia Beach leads by 16 points.
Nightlife. Steamboat Springs 20, Virginia Beach 37: Virginia Beach leads by 17 points.
Nature & outdoors. Steamboat Springs 88, Virginia Beach 56: Steamboat Springs leads by 32 points.
Day trips. Steamboat Springs 12, Virginia Beach 64: Virginia Beach leads by 52 points.
Good for families. Steamboat Springs 62, Virginia Beach 75: Virginia Beach leads by 13 points.
Getting around. Steamboat Springs 46, Virginia Beach 27: Steamboat Springs leads by 19 points.
Shopping & style. Steamboat Springs 22, Virginia Beach 32: Virginia Beach leads by 10 points.
Affordability. Steamboat Springs 17, Virginia Beach 40: Virginia Beach leads by 23 points.
Live music & performing arts. Steamboat Springs 28, Virginia Beach 38: Virginia Beach leads by 10 points.
Wellness & relaxation. Steamboat Springs 70, Virginia Beach 32: Steamboat Springs leads by 38 points.
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What lies behind each score is written up on the two cities’ own pages: Steamboat Springs and Virginia Beach.

Your match

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

Steamboat Springs
35match

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

Virginia Beach
Best match
46match

Wins on beaches and day trips with your weighting.

What matters to you?

When should you go?

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

Steamboat Springs in July

28 °Cdaytime high
10 °Cnight-time low
31 mmrain in the month
No seasea
15 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

-10°0°10°20°30°40°JFMAMJJASOND

Rainfall in the month, mm

050100150200JFMAMJJASOND
Steamboat SpringsVirginia Beach

Where the figures come from

Steamboat Springs 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. Steamboat Springs: 2011-2025 (rainfall 1991-2020) normals, Steamboat Springs / Steamboat Ii (5.5 km from centre). Virginia Beach: 1991-2020 normals, Virginia Beach / Gatewood Park (5.7 km from centre).

Before you go

MeasureSteamboat SpringsVirginia Beach
CurrencyUS Dollar (USD)US Dollar (USD)
SocketsAB120 V, 60 HzAB120 V, 60 Hz
Driving sideRightRight
Time zoneUTC-7, UTC-6 in summerUTC-5, UTC-4 in summer
Emergency number911911
Elevation2,052 m7 m
Main airportYampa Valley Airport (HDN)33 km from centre17 non-stop destinationsNorfolk International Airport (ORF)20 km from centre42 non-stop destinations
Public holidays this year12 days13 days

By the numbers

MeasureSteamboat SpringsVirginia Beach
City population13,224459,470
People per km²503-
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 Steamboat Springs 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.