VacationSelector
Playa Tamarindo, Tamarindo
TamarindoPlaya Tamarindo
Shibuya Crossing, Tokyo
TokyoShibuya Crossing

Photos: Tamarindo by Jarle Naustvik, CC BY 2.0, cropped; Tokyo by Benh LIEU SONG, CC BY-SA 2.0, cropped.

Tamarindo or Tokyo?

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 Tamarindo for

  • beaches
  • nature and the outdoors

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

Choose Tokyo for

  • shopping
  • culture and sights
  • live music and the arts

What lies behind each score is written up on Tokyo’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. Tamarindo 85, Tokyo 40: Tamarindo leads by 45 points.
Food & drink. Tamarindo 38, Tokyo 98: Tokyo leads by 60 points.
Culture & sights. Tamarindo 5, Tokyo 84: Tokyo leads by 79 points.
Nightlife. Tamarindo 45, Tokyo 86: Tokyo leads by 41 points.
Nature & outdoors. Tamarindo 76, Tokyo 68: Tamarindo leads by 8 points.
Day trips. Tamarindo 28, Tokyo 85: Tokyo leads by 57 points.
Good for families. Tamarindo 55, Tokyo 95: Tokyo leads by 40 points.
Getting around. Tamarindo 32, Tokyo 98: Tokyo leads by 66 points.
Shopping & style. Tamarindo 18, Tokyo 99: Tokyo leads by 81 points.
Affordability. Tamarindo 36, Tokyo 48: Tokyo leads by 12 points.
Live music & performing arts. Tamarindo 10, Tokyo 86: Tokyo leads by 76 points.
Wellness & relaxation. Tamarindo 45, Tokyo 78: Tokyo leads by 33 points.
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What lies behind each score is written up on the two cities’ own pages: Tamarindo and Tokyo.

Your match

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

Tamarindo
39match

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

Tokyo
Best match
80match

Wins on shopping 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.

Tamarindo in July

33 °Cdaytime high
23 °Cnight-time low
129 mmrain in the month
No recordsunshine a day
29 °Csea
13 hdaylight a day

Tokyo in July

30 °Cdaytime high
23 °Cnight-time low
157 mmrain in the month
5 hsunshine a day
23 °Csea
14 hdaylight a day

Daytime high, °C

0°10°20°30°40°JFMAMJJASOND

Rainfall in the month, mm

0100200300400JFMAMJJASOND
TamarindoTokyo

Where the figures come from

Tamarindo's temperatures are measured 54 km from the centre, at Liberia.

Tamarindo 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. Tamarindo: 1991-2020 normals, Liberia (53.8 km from centre). Tokyo: 1991-2020 normals, Tokyo (3.6 km from centre).

Before you go

MeasureTamarindoTokyo
Official languageSpanishJapanese
CurrencyCosta Rican Colon (CRC)Yen (JPY)
SocketsAB120 V, 60 HzAB100 V, 50 and 60 Hz depending on the region
Driving sideRightLeft
Time zoneUTC-6UTC+9
Emergency number911Police 110, fire 119
Elevation27 m6 m
Main airportDaniel Oduber Quirós International Airport (LIR)43 km from centre30 non-stop destinationsTokyo Haneda International Airport (HND)18 km from centre98 non-stop destinations
Public holidays this year11 days16 days

By the numbers

MeasureTamarindoTokyo
City population7,13214,264,798
People per km²576,501
Museums within 10 km0192
UNESCO World Heritage sites within 50 km01
Swim season, months above 21 °C12 months4 months

Where else could you go?

Every comparison below shares a destination with this one, so you can follow Tamarindo or Tokyo 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). 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. Exchange rates via Frankfurter, based on European Central Bank reference rates. 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.