AbstractThis paper explores the role of mining heritage tourism attributes on a destination's overall performance, and examines its competitiveness with other cities within the same regional boundary. Relevance‐determinance analysis (RDA) and competitive‐performance analysis (CPA) were used to achieve these objectives. The data were obtained from a simple random sampling questionnaire survey of tourists visiting the Sawahlunto old coal mining town, an UNESCO World Heritage Site in Indonesia. The study results indicate that mining heritage and natural beauty were not major determinants in the overall performance of the destination. Although these core attributes were considered very important in destination choice, they each had a relatively low influence on overall experience offered by the destination. Instead, the study found that three attributes, namely sport and recreational opportunities, shopping, and cuisine, were higher‐impact drivers of competitiveness. Because Sawahlunto's performance is below average, policies to enhance these three attributes while retaining the unique experience offered by the post‐mining context should be at the forefront of planning by local decision‐makers and destination managers.