VacationSelector
El Castillo above the beach at Tulum, Tulum
TulumEl Castillo above the beach at Tulum
People's Square (Narodni trg), Zadar
ZadarPeople's Square (Narodni trg)

Photos: Tulum by Bjørn Christian Tørrissen, CC BY-SA 3.0, cropped; Zadar by Böhringer Friedrich, CC BY-SA 2.5, cropped.

Tulum or Zadar?

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
  • nightlife
  • beaches

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

Choose Zadar for

  • getting around
  • culture and sights
  • prices

What lies behind each score is written up on Zadar’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, Zadar 72: Tulum leads by 16 points.
Food & drink. Tulum 52, Zadar 45: Tulum leads by 7 points.
Culture & sights. Tulum 30, Zadar 55: Zadar leads by 25 points.
Nightlife. Tulum 60, Zadar 38: Tulum leads by 22 points.
Nature & outdoors. Tulum 76, Zadar 82: Zadar leads by 6 points.
Day trips. Tulum 68, Zadar 70: Zadar leads by 2 points.
Good for families. Tulum 60, Zadar 55: Tulum leads by 5 points.
Getting around. Tulum 25, Zadar 58: Zadar leads by 33 points.
Shopping & style. Tulum 35, Zadar 27: Tulum leads by 8 points.
Affordability. Tulum 30, Zadar 52: Zadar leads by 22 points.
Live music & performing arts. Tulum 15, Zadar 28: Zadar leads by 13 points.
Wellness & relaxation. Tulum 85, Zadar 35: Tulum leads by 50 points.
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What lies behind each score is written up on the two cities’ own pages: Tulum and Zadar.

Your match

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

Too close to call, 1 point apart

Tulum
52match

Wins on wellness and nightlife with your weighting.

Zadar
51match

Wins on getting around 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.

Tulum in July

30 °Cdaytime high
26 °Cnight-time low
116 mmrain in the month
29 °Csea
13 hdaylight a day

Zadar in July

31 °Cdaytime high
18 °Cnight-time low
29 mmrain in the month
24 °Csea
15 hdaylight a day

Daytime high, °C

0°10°20°30°40°JFMAMJJASOND

Rainfall in the month, mm

050100150200250JFMAMJJASOND
TulumZadar

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.

Zadar 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. Tulum: 2001-2020 normals, NASA POWER reanalysis grid, no weather station within 90 km. Zadar: 1999-2020 (rainfall 1991-2020) normals, Zadar / Zemunik (9.9 km from centre).

Before you go

MeasureTulumZadar
Official languageSpanish, Nahuatl, Yucatec MayaCroatian
CurrencyMexican Peso (MXN)Euro (EUR)
SocketsAB127 V, 60 HzCF230 V, 50 Hz
Driving sideRightRight
Time zoneUTC-5UTC+1, UTC+2 in summer
Emergency number911112
Elevation5 m5 m
Main airportFelipe Carrillo Puerto International Airport Tulum (TQO)21 km from centre11 non-stop destinationsZadar Airport (ZAD)10 km from centre66 non-stop destinations
Public holidays this year9 days14 days

By the numbers

MeasureTulumZadar
City population33,37470,779
Museums within 10 km01
UNESCO World Heritage sites within 50 km02
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 Tulum or Zadar 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.