athens.taipei The Atlas of City Experiences
The Anti-Awards

24 rankings. Every one is the true extreme of a real measurement — there is no worst city, only cities magnificently bad at one specific thing.

All 24 rankings →
The weather6
The Sauna You Can’t LeaveThe Bedroom That Never CoolsThe Umbrella EconomyRain, By The MetreSixteen Thousand DaysThe Year Without a Window
The hours it keeps6
The Cinderella ClauseThe Early Bedtime AwardThe Sunday Ghost TownThe Breakfast DesertThe Great Lunch VanishingThe Part-Time City
Getting out5
The Great Escape IndexHardest City to Leave (In a Hurry)The Domestic BubbleThe Hibernating AirportThe Perth Meridian
The ground and the sky4
The Wobbliest GroundThe Volcano PartyThe Volcano Next DoorThe 3 p.m. Sunset Club
Everything else3
The Monoculture MenuThe Calendar of ExcusesA Gigabyte of Cats
Tools

Three ways to interrogate the atlas rather than read it.

Open the comparer →
Compare two cities Head-to-head on absurd terms only. No GDP, no cappuccino index. The year, month by month Where to be in each month, who has the most days off, and when the airports peak. Start from a goal Eat well at 2 a.m. · Work all day from a café — ranked by what the city keeps open.
How this is made

Every figure on this site states where it came from and what it cannot tell you.

Read the method →
Method & principles What we measure, what we refuse to guess, and why rhythm is never a claim about people. Sources Every corpus behind the atlas, with its licence. Books coming soon The long-form city profiles and the method book. Contact · request a city Tell us what the atlas is missing.
The index

126 cities across the atlas, by region — or browse the full A–Z.

Every city, A–Z →
Southern Europe21
RomeMilanBarcelonaMadridAthensLisbon
Western Europe20
LondonParisLuxembourgViennaAmsterdamDublin
North America & Caribbean18
New YorkMiamiAustinSan FranciscoLos AngelesSeattle
CEE & Balkans16
PragueBudapestWarsawBelgradeBucharestKraków
East Asia12
TokyoOsakaFukuokaSeoulBusanTaipei
South & Southeast Asia11
SingaporeBangkokKuala LumpurChiang MaiDa NangGeorge Town
🇬🇧 United Kingdom · metro 120k · 1,899 venues mapped

Colchester

Where Colchester places among 1,878 cities measured on the one thing that needs no editing — the hours the city keeps. Its strongest showing is shops open on sunday, where it ranks 61 of 1,704.

Nearest city 🇬🇧 Ipswich 26 km Nearest written profile 🇬🇧 London 📖 83 km

Typical weather

1981–present
JFMAMJJASOND
coldcool warmhot ▢ outlined = best time to visit
JFMAMJJASOND
Best time to visit Jun, Jul, Aug — mild (15–26 °C mean) and not wet months.

City Rhythm

measured

Opening hours, by kind of place

median across mapped venues
Food & drink1,899 places mapped
12:00–23:00
0006121824
4%
open past midnight
89%
open on Sundays
52h
open per week
12%
take a midday break
Shops & errands626 places mapped
07:00–22:00
0006121824
2%
open past midnight
94%
open on Sundays
96h
open per week
3%
open 24/7
Services249 places mapped
09:00–17:30
0006121824
0%
open past midnight
21%
open on Sundays
47h
open per week

Vital absurdities

measured
0
muggy days a year
0
nights/yr the bedroom never cools
137
umbrella days a year
31.2 m
of rain since 1981
12
days over 30 °C, of 16,630
0
volcanoes within 100 km
457.5 km
to West Eifel Volcanic Field
0.2
quakes felt per decade (M4.5+, 100 km)
15:48
winter sunset (solar approx.)
16.7 h
longest day of the year
6
public holidays, 2024
14,410
km adrift · the Remote Index

The ranks

floor: 200 mapped venues
MeasureColchester RankNearest company
Kitchens open past midnight% of food & drink 3.8% 262 of 1,878 🇱🇰 Ambalangoda 3.8%🇺🇸 Asheville 3.8%🇨🇺 Camagüey 3.8%🇮🇳 Chandigarh 3.8%Colchester🇫🇷 Douai 3.8%🇩🇪 Hamm 3.8%🇹🇳 Hammamet 3.8%🇮🇳 Jaipur 3.8%
Hours open per weekmedian, food & drink 52 h 216 of 1,878 🇮🇹 Reggio nell'Emilia 52.5 h🇫🇷 Royan 52.5 h🇩🇪 Neuwied 52.2 h🇮🇹 Vicenza 52.2 hColchester🇩🇪 Kehl 52 h🇩🇪 Mönchengladbach 52 h🇩🇪 Osnabrück 52 h🇻🇪 San Cristobal 52 h
Open before 8 a.m.% of food & drink 8.5% 387 of 1,878 🇷🇺 Surgut 8.6%🇵🇱 Szczecin 8.6%🇵🇹 Vila Real 8.6%🇵🇱 Wrocław 8.6%Colchester🇩🇰 Copenhagen 8.5%🇳🇱 Hoofddorp 8.5%🇨🇴 Ibagué 8.5%🇩🇪 Lübeck 8.5%
Vanish at lunch% taking a midday break 11.9% 271 of 1,878 🇸🇬 Singapore 12.1%🇯🇵 Muroran 12%🇨🇦 Peterborough 12%🇦🇹 Sankt Pölten 12%Colchester🇩🇪 Görlitz 11.9%🇴🇲 Muscat 11.9%🇮🇹 Taranto 11.9%🇬🇧 Doncaster 11.8%
Never close at all% open 24/7 1.7% 214 of 1,878 🇬🇧 Aberdeen 1.7%🇳🇱 Alphen aan den Rijn 1.7%🇬🇧 Bracknell 1.7%🇩🇪 Bremen 1.7%Colchester🇮🇹 Forlì 1.7%🇯🇵 Komatsu 1.7%🇺🇸 Las Cruces 1.7%🇬🇧 Littlehampton 1.7%
Shops open on Sunday% of retail 93.8% 61 of 1,704 🇺🇸 Tulsa 93.9%🇺🇸 Turlock 93.9%🇷🇴 Târgoviște 93.9%🇺🇸 Atascocita 93.8%Colchester🇬🇧 Coleraine 93.8%🇵🇭 Dumaguete 93.8%🇺🇸 Easton 93.8%🇲🇾 George Town 93.8%

The same questions are asked of the 126 cities with a written profile, where each one gets its method and its full standings: kitchens open past midnight, hours open per week, open before 8 a.m., vanish at lunch, shops open on sunday.

← All 1,878 ranked cities