Alicante/Alacant · Comunidad Valenciana
Alacant
Valencia's elegant second city — proper Mediterranean seafront paseos and healthy nightlife, unfairly lumped in with the brasher Costa Blanca resorts.
What Alacant is like
Portrait drawn from The Rough Guide.
The Costa Blanca's provincial capital.
On the table. A culinary scene making a name for itself, alongside long-established nightlife.
Worth the trip
- Seafront paseos like Rambla Méndez Núñez, lined with bars and terrace cafés
- A series of well-curated museums, from ancient archaeology to contemporary art
- Playa del Postiguet, the city's own beach
- Playa Arenales, a quieter dune-backed beach 12km south
Fiestas
- Las Hogueras de San Juan, end of June — second only to Las Fallas in scale
- Fiesta de Moros y Cristianos, nearby Alcoy, around 23 April
A little history
Founded by the Romans as Lucentum ('City of Light'), ruled by the Arabs from the late 8th century, reconquered by Alfonso X in 1246, and incorporated into the Kingdom of Valencia in 1308.
Who it suits: City travellers wanting Mediterranean culture without a resort vibe
The numbers
The decision data — each figure against the Spanish average. Regional overlays and estimates are labelled, and where there's no local reading we say so plainly.
Climate
- Winter average temp
- 13.1°C 5.3°C above the Spanish average (7.8°C)
- Summer high (Jul–Aug)
- 30.9°C 0.7°C above the Spanish average (30.2°C)
- Rainy days a year
- 35 days 49% less than the Spanish average (69 days)
- Sunshine
- 8.2 h/day 14% more than the Spanish average (7.2 h/day)
- Summer water stress (WEI+) regional estimate
- 154 97 above the Spanish average (56)
Cost & economy
- Home price
- €2,265/m² 3% more than the Spanish average (€2,208/m²)
- Net income per person
- €13,681 6% less than the Spanish average (€14,495)
- Income growth ’18–’23
- 23%
Schools
- Schools in town
- 154
- Nearest international school
- 7 km
- PISA maths (region) regional estimate
- 473 8 below the Spanish average (481)
Healthcare
- Drive to a hospital
- 0 min
- Nearest health centre
- no local data
- Surgical wait (region) regional estimate
- 88 days 18% less than the Spanish average (108 days)
Getting around
- Drive to nearest airport
- 38 min
- Fibre-to-home coverage
- 97% 18% above the Spanish average (79%)
- 100 Mbps+ coverage
- 99% 15% above the Spanish average (83%)
Who lives here
- Population
- 365,586
- Born in Spain
- 71.1% 17.7% below the Spanish average (88.8%)
- Born elsewhere in EU/UK
- 3.9% 0.1% above the Spanish average (3.8%)
- U.S.-born residents
- 2.4 per 1,000
Numbers: SettleSpain town dataset, derived from INE, AEMET, Mitma, Ministerio del Interior and the Catastro. National average = the unweighted mean across all 8,132 Spanish municipalities with data. A blank means no municipal-level figure is published — not a zero.
How does Alacant fit you?
These are the town's numbers. Whether it's your town depends on what you're optimising for — winter sun or mild summers, a city or a village, short medical waits, an easy flight home. The 3-minute quiz scores Alacant against every one of Spain's 8,132 municipalities on your priorities. It sits about 11 min from Sant Vicent del Raspeig/San Vicente del Raspeig, if that's your anchor.
Take the quiz — rank Alacant for you →Nearby towns
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