En un lugar Where to live in Spain, compared on official data Nederlands Units

← All places

Figueres, Girona: population, climate, prices

Girona, Catalonia · 49,689 inhabitants (1 Jan 2025)

Living in Figueres

Figueres is a small town of 49,689 inhabitants 15 km from the sea in Girona (Catalonia), with cold winters and hot summers (January nights 2.5°C, August afternoons 29.2°C). 27.9% of residents are foreign nationals (7.7% among the over-65s), so English-speaking services are common. Year-round direct flights to Amsterdam, London, Brussels, Paris and the US leave from Girona-Costa Brava Airport (GRO), 43 km away. Everyday essentials (food shops, pharmacies, cafés, parks, bus stops, a library) are all within a 10-minute walk of the centre. Against that, the nearest public hospital is 33 km away in Girona; recorded crime is high (71.2 per 1,000 residents; Spain about 41); public waiting lists in Catalonia are long (142 days on average for planned surgery). Around 2055, Spain's official climate scenarios put August afternoons here at about 30.6°C and the number of warm nights at 30 a year.

Each sentence is chosen by where the town ranks among the 333 places compared on that measure (top or bottom 20%); the numbers are the ones in the sections below, from the sources named there.

About Figueres

Figueres
Photo: Martine SODAIGUI, CC BY-SA 3.0

Figueres is the capital city of Alt Empordà County, in the Girona region, Catalonia, Spain. The town is the birthplace of artist Salvador Dalí, and houses the Dalí Theatre and Museum, a large museum designed by Dalí himself which attracts many visitors. It is also the birthplace of Narcís Monturiol, inventor of the first successful machine-powered submarine. Also born here was Mónica Naranjo, one of the best-selling Spanish singers of the 1990s and 2000s.

From Wikipedia, CC BY-SA 4.0. Read more on Wikipedia →

Buying: appraised price
1,387 €/m²
Last 4 quarters to 2026 Q2, 622 valuations. 1 year 10.1%, 5 years 20.3%.
Renting: typical apartment
500 €/month
6.14 €/m² per month for a typical 86 m² (2024 contracts). 5 years 17.8%. Houses: 556 €/month.
Safety: recorded crime
71.2 per 1,000
Conventional crime 2025 (Spain ≈ 41). Home burglaries 1.49, violent robbery 2.50, theft 21.4 per 1,000. 1 year -0.7%.
Sea
14.9 km
Straight-line distance from the town centre to the coast.
Crime is counted where it happens, so places with many visitors (airports, resorts, big tourist centres) score worse than daily life there feels for residents.

Getting there

Nearest airport
Girona-Costa Brava Airport (GRO), 43 km, 2,185,561 passengers in 2025, 18 destinations
Direct to Amsterdam
Barcelona airport, 130 km (year-round)
Direct to Brussels (Zaventem or Charleroi)
Perpignan airport, 53 km (year-round)
Direct to London
Girona airport, 43 km (year-round)
Direct to Paris
Perpignan airport, 53 km (year-round)
Direct to Frankfurt
Barcelona airport, 130 km (year-round)
Direct to the US
Barcelona airport, 130 km (year-round)
Train station
Figueres-Vilafant (0.6 km)
Fastest train to Madrid
4 h 15
Fastest train to Barcelona
0 h 42

Distances are straight-line. Flights as listed in airport route tables on 4 Oct 2026; train times from Renfe's timetable (Iryo and Ouigo not included).

Healthcare

Nearest public general hospital
Hospital Universitari de Girona Dr. Josep Trueta (33 km away, in Girona, 431 beds)
Nearest large public hospital (500+ beds, most specialties)
Hospital de Sabadell (106 km away, in Sabadell, 861 beds)
Nearest private general hospital
Hospital de Figueres (in town, 168 beds)
General hospitals within 25 km
3
Waiting time for planned surgery (Catalonia)
142 days on average; 32.0% wait more than 6 months (Spain: 121 days)
Waiting time for a first specialist visit
120 days on average; 72.3% wait more than 60 days (Spain: 102 days)

Ministry of Health, National Hospital Catalogue 2025 (situation on 31 Dec 2024); general hospitals only. Distances are straight-line to the hospital's municipality. Residents registered in Spain use public hospitals; non-EU applicants for some visas must have private health insurance. Waiting times are for the whole region (public health service, 31 Dec 2025), as reported by each region to the Ministry of Health (SISLE-SNS); private insurance usually avoids most of the wait.

International schools

Nearest international school
International School of Costa Brava (curriculum not stated), Platja d'Aro, 50.6 km
International schools within 25 km
0
Nearest by curriculum (within 100 km)
none of these within 100 km

Ministry of Education, register of non-university schools (RCD), October 2026: every school authorised to teach a foreign curriculum in Spain, without the business, arts and hairdressing schools in the same list and without schools for one nationality (Japanese, Libyan, Iraqi, Russian, Panamanian). Curriculum as labelled in the register or clear from the school's name; levels as listed in the register, which leaves them out for some schools. Straight-line distance from the town centre. We do not rate schools: visit, and ask about accreditation and fees.

Who lives here

Population trend
+9.6% in ten years (45,346 in 2015, 49,689 in 2025)
Age
16.2% aged 65 or over, 18.1% under 16 (2022; Spain: 20.0% and 14.9%)
Local income
12,566 € net per person per year (2023), 84% of the Spanish average; median 16,450 € per adult-equivalent
Foreign residents
27.9% of all residents; 7.7% of residents aged 65+ (2022)
Largest nationalities
Moroccan 10.6%, Romanian 1.7%, Colombian 1.2%, French 0.7%, Venezuelan 0.6%; all EU citizens 3.8% (share of all residents, 1 Jan 2022; the Netherlands, Belgium, Ireland and the Nordic countries are not published per town)

INE: population register (Padrón) and household income atlas. Local income is a rough guide to local prices and affluence; Spain publishes no official cost-of-living index for towns.

Within a 10-minute walk of the centre

Everyday essentials on foot
6 of 6 ✓ 15+ food shops ✓ 3+ pharmacies ✓ 25+ cafés, bars or restaurants ✓ 2+ parks ✓ 3+ bus stops ✓ 2+ libraries, theatres, cinemas or cultural centres
Lively centre
77 out of 100: how much there is compared with the other 332 places (big cities score highest)

Counted in OpenStreetMap within 800 m of the town centre, taken as the point OpenStreetMap marks as the town's centre, moved at most 500 m to the busiest nearby spot (for a few spread-out municipalities without such a point: the busiest spot near the official coordinate). OpenStreetMap is kept by volunteers: very complete in most Spanish towns, thinner in some. “Everyday essentials” only asks whether the basics are there, so a small town can score 6 of 6; “lively centre” ranks each count among all 333 places and averages them, so it mostly reflects size. Large municipalities with several centres (Lorca, Oleiros, Ames…) can score low because their official centre is a small village.

Holiday lets and beaches

Tourist apartments
145 (0.69% of all homes; Spain 1.28%), 1.3 tourist beds per 100 residents (May 2026)
Blue Flag beaches
nearest in Castelló d’Empúries, 10 km; 4 within 30 km

Tourist apartments: INE count of homes listed on Airbnb, Booking and Vrbo. A high share means busy summers and pressure on rents. Blue Flag 2026 (ADEAC): beaches meeting water-quality, safety and service standards; this includes some lake and river beaches. Distances are straight-line between town centres.

Water

River basin
Cuencas Internas De Cataluña
Reservoirs now
73.6% full (week of 2026-09-29); the same week in the previous 10 years averaged 57.5%
Worst week 2016-2025
14.5% full (2024-03-05)
Weeks below 40% full, 2016-2025
26% of all weeks

Ministry for the Ecological Transition, weekly hydrological bulletin: all reservoirs over 5 hm³ in the basin. Low reservoirs are what led to drought restrictions in Catalonia (2023-24) and Andalusia (2022-24). Some basins (Segura) also rely on transfers and desalination, so their reservoir level alone overstates the risk of taps running dry.

What the rankings say

Not named in the rankings we track.

Climate

0°C5°C10°C15°C20°C25°C30°CJan: None rainy daysFeb: None rainy daysMar: 5.7 rainy daysApr: 6.1 rainy daysMay: None rainy daysJun: 3.5 rainy daysJul: 2.5 rainy daysAug: 2.9 rainy daysSep: None rainy daysOct: 6.0 rainy daysNov: 5.1 rainy daysDec: 2.5 rainy daysJan: 13.2 °C (56 °F)Feb: 14.1 °C (57 °F)Mar: 16.7 °C (62 °F)Apr: 19.1 °C (66 °F)May: 22.5 °C (72 °F)Jun: 26.6 °C (80 °F)Jul: 29.1 °C (84 °F)Aug: 29.2 °C (85 °F)Sep: 26.0 °C (79 °F)Oct: 22.0 °C (72 °F)Nov: 16.9 °C (62 °F)Dec: 14.0 °C (57 °F)Jan: 2.5 °C (36 °F)Feb: 3.0 °C (37 °F)Mar: 5.4 °C (42 °F)Apr: 8.0 °C (46 °F)May: 11.7 °C (53 °F)Jun: 15.4 °C (60 °F)Jul: 17.7 °C (64 °F)Aug: 17.7 °C (64 °F)Sep: 14.4 °C (58 °F)Oct: 11.4 °C (53 °F)Nov: 6.6 °C (44 °F)Dec: 2.9 °C (37 °F)JanFebMarAprMayJunJulAugSepOctNovDec

● average daily high   ● average nightly low   ■ rainy days (1 mm or more). These are 1991-2020 averages, not record temperatures: a hot spell will be warmer and a cold night colder than these values.

JanFebMarAprMayJunJulAugSepOctNovDec
Average daily high, °C13.214.116.719.122.526.629.129.226.022.016.914.0
Average nightly low, °C2.53.05.48.011.715.417.717.714.411.46.62.9
Rain, mm4857272223895423
Rainy days (1 mm or more)5.76.13.52.52.96.05.12.5
Humidity, %70707069666570767674
Days reaching 30 °C / 86 °F0.00.00.00.00.24.312.713.62.90.50.00.0

The year in numbers

Köppen climate class
Csa: Hot-summer Mediterranean
Summer mugginess (August average dew point)
18.4°C – oppressive
Days reaching 25 °C / 77 °F
110 a year (estimate)
Days reaching 30 °C / 86 °F
34 a year
Days reaching 35 °C / 95 °F
1 a year (estimate)
Warm nights (low of 20 °C / 68 °F or more)
11 a year (estimate)
Frost nights (0 °C / 32 °F or less)
20 a year

Dew point measures how sticky the air feels: under 13 °C (55 °F) feels dry, 16-18 °C (61-64 °F) muggy, over 18 °C oppressive. For comparison, Davis, California (also Köppen Csa) has a summer dew point of about 11 °C. "Typical hottest day" is the 1991-2020 average of each year's single hottest day. Estimates are counted from daily satellite data adjusted to this place's averages; checked against AEMET's own 30 °C counts they are usually within 4 days a year.

1991-2020 averages, AEMET station CASTELLÓ D'EMPÚRIES (0411X), 11.7 km away; temperatures adjusted to the town's altitude. © AEMET.

Around 2055 (projection)

August average high
30.6°C: +1.3 °C compared with today (models range from 0.7 °C to 2.6 °C)
Warm nights (low of 20 °C / 68 °F or more)
30 a year, +18 (models: +8 to +31)
Frost nights
19 a year (-1)
Rainy days (1 mm or more)
-6 (models: -10 to +0)
Rain amount
-7% over the year: summer -24%, winter +0%
Sunlight reaching the ground
+0.4% (models: -0.8% to +1.6%); no official sunshine-hours projection exists

Spain's official climate scenarios (Escenarios-PNACC 2024, AEMET regionalisation of 11 global climate models, ~5 km grid), middle emissions scenario SSP2-4.5: average change from 2011-2040 to 2041-2070, added to today's 1991-2020 values above. The range shows the lowest and highest of the 11 models. Rain: the same models regionalised by CSIC (DeepESD). Sunlight: EURO-CORDEX regional models (RCP4.5). A projection, not a forecast. Read: Spain around 2055, region by region →

Questions people ask

Where is Figueres?

Figueres is in the province of Girona (Catalonia), Spain, 15 km from the sea. The nearest airport is Girona-Costa Brava Airport (GRO), 43 km away.

How many people live in Figueres?

49,689 registered residents on 1 January 2025 (INE), +9.6% in ten years.

What is the climate of Figueres?

January afternoons average 13.2°C and nights 2.5°C; August afternoons 29.2°C.

Is Figueres safe?

Recorded conventional crime in Figueres was 71.2 offences per 1,000 residents in 2025, high for Spain (national rate about 41). Home burglaries: 1.49 per 1,000.

How hot is Figueres in summer?

August afternoons average 29.2°C (1991-2020), with 11 nights a year above 20 °C and 1 days of 35 °C or more.

How cold is Figueres in winter?

January afternoons average 13.2°C and January nights 2.5°C, with 20 frost nights a year.

Is there a hospital in Figueres?

The nearest public general hospital is Hospital Universitari de Girona Dr. Josep Trueta in Girona, 33 km away. Planned surgery in Catalonia waits 142 days on average.

Can you fly direct from Figueres to Amsterdam or London all year?

Yes. Girona-Costa Brava Airport (GRO) (43 km away) has year-round direct flights to Amsterdam, London, Brussels, Paris and the US.

What does it cost to rent or buy in Figueres?

A typical apartment (86 m²) rented for 500 € a month in 2024 contracts. Homes were appraised at 1,387 €/m² on average over the last four quarters, 20.3% in five years.

Nearby and similar towns

Nearest towns in this comparison
Girona (Girona, 33 km), Salt (Girona, 35 km), Olot (Girona, 39 km), Lloret de Mar (Girona, 64 km), Blanes (Girona, 67 km)
Most similar towns (summer heat, winter nights, rainy days, home prices, size)
Miranda de Ebro (Burgos), Tudela (Navarre), Zamora (Zamora), Alcoi/Alcoy (Alicante), Palencia (Palencia)

Distances are straight-line between town centres. Similarity is the distance in standardised values of the five measures.