Methodology
How we score, rank, and synthesize information across destinations. Every ranking on WhenRome derives from named criteria — no editorial picks dressed up as data.
"Best time to visit" rankings
For each city, every month is scored 0-10 across five dimensions:
- Temperature comfort (40% weight) — penalises both heat (above 32°C avg high) and cold (below 5°C avg high).
- Rainfall (25%) — penalises months with >10 rain days.
- Hazard avoidance (15%) — adjusts down during peak hurricane, monsoon, or typhoon months for that location.
- Daylight hours (10%) — penalises short-daylight winter months at high latitudes.
- Crowd levels (10%) — adjusts down during peak tourist seasons.
Months are then bucketed into "perfect / good / fair / avoid" tiers. No single month's score is a "rating" — it's a relative comparison within that city's annual cycle.
Solo female safety scores (1-5)
Composite of:
- Numbeo crime index for the city (independent crowdsourced data)
- Travel Ladies forum sentiment over the prior 24 months
- Government women-traveler advisories (US State Department, UK FCDO, AU DFAT)
- WGI gender-equality index for the country
5 = top-tier safe for solo women across day, night, and transit. 1 = significant caution required across multiple dimensions.
LGBT-friendliness scores (1-5)
Two scores per country: Safety (public safety + harassment risk) and Openness (cultural acceptance). Both derived from:
- ILGA-Europe Rainbow Map and ILGA World legal-status data
- Equaldex country snapshots
- Spartacus Gay Travel Index where applicable
- Government advisories specific to LGBT travelers (US State Department LGBTQI+ Traveler page, FCDO)
Digital nomad ranking (total /25)
Five-dimension composite, each scored 1-5:
- Visa friendliness — does the country offer a digital-nomad visa? How easy to qualify?
- Wifi quality — Speedtest average + public-wifi availability + outage rate.
- Cost of living — Nomad List monthly-spend estimate. 5 = cheapest, 1 = most expensive.
- Climate — How many months of the year are pleasant for outdoor lifestyle (15-28°C average highs, low extreme weather).
- Community — Established coworking + nomad-meetup scene + cafe culture.
Family-with-kids scores by age
Four scores per city, one per age bracket (infant 0-2, toddler 3-5, kid 6-12, teen 13-17):
- Stroller-friendliness (heavier in infant + toddler).
- Kid-meal availability on standard restaurant menus.
- Age-appropriate attractions within central city.
- Safety + family-acceptance culture.
Climate twin matching
Two cities are "climate twins" if their monthly averages match within tolerance across temperature, humidity, and rainfall. We use Euclidean distance over the 12-month vector; closer = more similar. Twins are typically within 1.5°C and 2 rain days/month at every point in the year.
Honest limitations
- Climate averages mean nothing for any specific year. 2023 in Spain was hotter than the 30-year average — averages tell you what to plan for, not what you'll get.
- Safety scores reflect aggregated history, not the day you arrive. Local political situations, recent events, and individual circumstances always matter.
- Visa rules change. Always verify on the destination country's official site within 30 days of travel.
- Cost data lags reality. We update quarterly; in inflation-hit countries (Argentina, Türkiye), figures may be stale by months.