VacationSelector
El Castillo above the beach at Tulum, Tulum
TulumEl Castillo above the beach at Tulum
Valletta from the water, Valletta
VallettaValletta from the water

Photos: Tulum by Bjørn Christian Tørrissen, CC BY-SA 3.0, cropped; Valletta by Pho Tomass, Pexels License.

Tulum or Valletta?

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 Tulum for

  • wellness
  • beaches
  • nature and the outdoors

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

Choose Valletta for

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

What lies behind each score is written up on Valletta’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. Tulum 88, Valletta 68: Tulum leads by 20 points.
Food & drink. Tulum 52, Valletta 55: Valletta leads by 3 points.
Culture & sights. Tulum 30, Valletta 76: Valletta leads by 46 points.
Nightlife. Tulum 60, Valletta 46: Tulum leads by 14 points.
Nature & outdoors. Tulum 76, Valletta 56: Tulum leads by 20 points.
Day trips. Tulum 68, Valletta 76: Valletta leads by 8 points.
Good for families. Tulum 60, Valletta 58: Tulum leads by 2 points.
Getting around. Tulum 25, Valletta 62: Valletta leads by 37 points.
Shopping & style. Tulum 35, Valletta 38: Valletta leads by 3 points.
Affordability. Tulum 30, Valletta 50: Valletta leads by 20 points.
Live music & performing arts. Tulum 15, Valletta 44: Valletta leads by 29 points.
Wellness & relaxation. Tulum 85, Valletta 32: Tulum leads by 53 points.
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What lies behind each score is written up on the two cities’ own pages: Tulum and Valletta.

Your match

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

Tulum
52match

Wins on wellness and beaches with your weighting.

Valletta
Best match
55match

Wins on culture and sights and getting around with your weighting.

What matters to you?

When should you go?

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

Tulum in July

30 °Cdaytime high
26 °Cnight-time low
116 mmrain in the month
No recordsunshine a day
29 °Csea
13 hdaylight a day

Valletta in July

32 °Cdaytime high
22 °Cnight-time low
0 mmrain in the month
12 hsunshine a day
25 °Csea
14 hdaylight a day

Daytime high, °C

0°10°20°30°40°JFMAMJJASOND

Rainfall in the month, mm

050100150200250JFMAMJJASOND
TulumValletta

Where the figures come from

Tulum has no weather station within reach, so its figures come from a gridded climate model rather than a measured record, and read a broad area rather than the city itself.

Temperature and rainfall are climate normals, averaged over the years shown. Tulum: 2001-2020 normals, NASA POWER reanalysis grid, no weather station within 90 km. Valletta: 1991-2020 normals, Luqa (5.9 km from centre).

Before you go

MeasureTulumValletta
Official languageSpanish, Nahuatl, Yucatec MayaEnglish, Maltese
CurrencyMexican Peso (MXN)Euro (EUR)
SocketsAB127 V, 60 HzG230 V, 50 Hz
Driving sideRightLeft
Time zoneUTC-5UTC+1, UTC+2 in summer
Emergency number911112
Elevation5 m56 m
Main airportFelipe Carrillo Puerto International Airport Tulum (TQO)21 km from centre11 non-stop destinationsMalta International Airport (MLA)6 km from centre113 non-stop destinations
Public holidays this year9 days14 days

By the numbers

MeasureTulumValletta
City population33,3745,197
People per km²-6,496
Museums within 10 km016
UNESCO World Heritage sites within 50 km03
Swim season, months above 21 °C12 months6 months

Where else could you go?

Every comparison below shares a destination with this one, so you can follow Tulum or Valletta somewhere new.

Browse every destination

Sources

Structured data from Wikidata (CC0). Temperature and rainfall for destinations with no weather station are from the NASA POWER 2001-2020 climatology, derived from MERRA-2. 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. Weather data by Meteostat. Meteorological data provided by NOAA, DWD and others. 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.