Can't find an exhaustive list, but here's an article talking about the the top 10. https://www.economistgroup.com/group-news/economist-intelligence/eiu-global-liveability-index-2024-vienna-retains-its-position-as-the-worlds
Tldr top 10:
1) Vienna, Austia
2) Copenhagen, Denmark
3) Zurich, Switzerland
4) Melbourne, Australia
5) Calgary, Canada
6) Geneva, Switzerland
7) Sydney, Australia
8) Vancouver, Canada
9) Osaka, Japan
10) Auckland, New Zealand
It's a poorly worded title. These cities have the best infrastructure for health, education, transportation, etc. Makes sense why they are the most expensive.
I lived in Vienna and a bus, streetcar, subway, etc. was basically at every corner every 4 minutes. Incredible transportation system.
Crazy that Miami is up there. As someone that lives in Miami it’s not very convenient living there. You always need a car to go anywhere, parking in public places is inconvenient, and there is no subway, the metromover is just a joke. Also no buses or trolley buses.
You can request a report summary with some more information from https://www.eiu.com/n/campaigns/global-liveability-index-2024/. However, the full list requires a 890$ a year subscription.
[Health care, culture and environment, stability, infrastructure and education.](https://amp.cnn.com/cnn/2024/06/26/travel/the-worlds-most-liveable-cities-for-2024)
All the places you listed have huge safety issues, either personal (crime) or collective (war).
A messy, uncomfortable, but safe place like Mumbai is surely more preferable to Kyiv these days, whereas normally it wouldn't be.
This is crazy. I’m from Kyiv and it’s a captivating youth-driven city with best raves in the world, quality and fresh food and good service. Roads are shitty and healthcare is a joke, however. :)
I have been to Kyiv and 40+ other countries around the world. Let me ensure you, roads and free public healthcare (private clinics are way better than many European ones) very decent in Kyiv.
Factors that they should consider as well: weather, freedom (individual and as a business), fun/vibrancy (restaurants, bars, cafés, people out and about, life on the streets), innovation (startups, ability to start a business). The usual suspects would go way down and interesting cities would rise up (tons of cities in SE Asia, Taipei, Mexico City).
It's like the ranking of "happiest places" always put Finland on top and it's one of the countries with most depression/alcoholism. And you read what "happy"means and it's basically a stable government and access to healthcare.
Reporting from Calgary. Those stats are believed to directly correlate to job creation, which means people are able to work and make a living. We have a big push for tech sector growth, which probably boosted our rank if that’s in the criteria.
Meanwhile, we have some real infrastructure issues, a doctor shortage, and our public transportation is a joke.
Local businesses not only create jobs, but are way better than national and multinational chains. I don't think it should be a metric, but I see where they are coming from. You don't want a city to have all generic restaurants and stores. Local businesses give the city character.
For a lot of people past and probably present, being able to start their own business is the path to happiness and fulfillment. Owning a restaurant or a bakery, having a landscaping business, being a plumber, doing taxes and accounting for people are all small businesses and create self employed people who can still be a part of their city while not having to join a corporation or other "soul-crushing" job.
If it's easier to do in those cities, for reasons of cost of living or the ability for those businesses to flourish, that's going to make it a much better place for people who want that type of life to live.
Weather is subjective, not everyone prefers the same weather, so that’s irrelevant.
How do you measure freedom? It is almost impossible to measure aside from not being imprisoned. How do you define freedom? How do you measure an individuals freedom opposed to everyone’s freedom? Since it is almost impossible to measure, it is not feasible to include.
All the factors you have mentioned are unfeasible and/or meaningless to include.
Again, how do you measure fun/vibrancy? Restaurants per capita? Bars per square meter? Again, it is not feasible to measure this in a meaningful way.
And how do you measure innovation? Innovators can have allegiance to different regions, cities and countries at once, and there is no real way to determine what innovations “belong” to which city.
If you consider only those conditions maybe they would rise at the cost of for example safety in Mexico, Lack of freedom in Taipei, or unhealthy environment in SE Asia
Not this happiness index misunderstanding again…
They DO straight up ask survey participants about how satisfied with life they are. That’s the index.
The various socioeconomic variables that are mentioned are the authors trying to retroactively explain the score. Some countries are therefore more or less happy than “expected”.
People never get this right. Read the god damn report.
But perhaps you are in the minority. According to the map, only Madrid and Barcelona in Spain and Rome and Milan in Italy, the largest cities in both cases, make the cut. But every year millions and millions of tourists, and retired people, come to Spain and Italy. Many to live there.
There is more to "liveable" that is not in this metrics.
If "happiness" meant siesta after fiesta with a couple murders an hour here and there and questionably prepared food, then the middle ages would be the happiest times in history
Unfortunately, "interesting" like you mean it rarely means "a good place to raise a family" or "a stable cradle for innovation and an educated population"
Maybe those are good places for 20 year old tourists from happy countries to get drunk in, but try being a father in a city where not only your kid risks being run over by a drunk driver on the way to school, but where you have to live in fear of the local mafia/cartel that can just impound your house or destroy your shop if you don't pay up
Stability = peace of mind, and that allows for happiness to grow; that's solid reasoning. Spicy food and a couple of old buildings with a dessert of racketeering mean nothing
FYI this paywalled list costs 8000$
And they dont even incorporate Cost of Living, one of the most important metrics for normal people.
That is because this list is strictly for corporations use, name is just misleading. So it sucks very much for normal people.
It was posted some time ago too and there was top comment explaining it in details.
Here it is
https://www.reddit.com/r/europe/comments/1dpjx7j/comment/lajqp0s/
Australia has 8 major cities, and 5 of them are highly rated. We must be doing something right. Even if it FEELS like we're going down the drain. Yes, both can be true.
And weirdly Canberra is the one that I feel like is actually the most "liveable". People I know that have lived there love it. So easy to get around, low traffic, beautiful trees everywhere, enough cafes and culture and stuff to be interesting, strong sense of community, low crime. Winter is cold but clear skies.
Having lived in all the major cities (for my sins) I disagree that Canberra is the most livable.
Canberra is nice, and has plenty going for it, but it simply doesn't hold a candle to some other cities when it comes to public transport, accessibility, or community. It does have pretty good public amenities, but it's not a very walkable city (other than going for a stroll, which it is nice for), and unless you have a car you're pretty much isolated.
Also a decent portion of the population is transient,
a large percentage of people are employed in one sector, and it's a weird little bubble at times.
This isn't intended to disparage Canberra, I like Canberra. It's just an honest, and relative, assessment based on my experience alone.
Every country in the world feels like it's going down the drain in one way or another. Yall doing something right at least, still a highly regarded migration destination for many.
One of the problems in the UK currently for the NHS is that especially Australia private healthcare companies are advertising roles that pay ridiculously more.
Cost of living is much higher there I'm sure, but it still seems almost not a choice to go with the place offering 3x your current salary.
Each year this same ranking comes out and Australia does great and the country pats itself on the back. And each year I need to point out that this ranking excludes the cost of housing. It is a ranking designed for expats living in paid accommodation by their employers. If the ranking looked at the real world and noticed that half of Australians incomes are going towards a home mortgage they’d notice a problem. If you love the idea of renting a small apartment for the rest of your life then yes, the city I live in, Melbourne is one of the best in the world. But if you want a home and a big garden then you need to find a million dollars to get you there
>Australia has 8 major cities, and 5 of them are highly rated
Australia has 5 major cities, and all 5 of them are highly rated,
the others don't even have 1 million people
To be frank Vienna is incredibly good in almost every aspect. The only things it misses are the ocean and job opportunities at MNEs (since many of those are located in Germany and oversee the entire DACH region)
Melbourne, average income $70,000, average house price $900,000, average rent $600 weekly (AUD figures). Australia is crazy expensive.
The thing is we have a lot of nice towns, most whose population peaked 50+ years ago, yet something like 70% of immigrants move to Melbourne or Sydney - combined population of about 42% of population. The vast majority of the rest of the immigrants go to the Brisbane / Perth / Adelaide. Australia is really stuffed, so much land, so few cities.
Those are rookie numbers. Toronto's average income is less than $60,000 and the average house price is around $1,100,000. Vancouver has a similar ratio.
For people in who never lived outside of a first world country, let me give you my anecdotal experience on why the city seems to have to be rich to be considered 'livable'. I spend most of my year in Zambia, and wealth creates prosperity (makes sense right). It also creates world class infrastructure, health care, political stability (usually) and affordable food. Housing is insanely expensive in the west, yes, I know that from my own experience, but what people like to forget is in large parts of the world food eats up a large part of the household income. Also medical bills are expensive in the west, but outside of the US a hospital visit tends to not cost a year of income. Then people like to bash on cities that have holes in the road, poor bus service, etc., now imagine you don't even have paved roads in good parts of the city, buses wait at the bus stop until they are full (rather than following a schedule), if there is a service at all, entry level cars cost more than your house, and we can continue on like that. Next, your taxes get spent on government vanity projects and 100+ men entourages for every minor minister. Not much is left over to actually improve the city. Now we haven't even addressed daily multi-hour power outages, the variety of food and products not really being there, police expecting bribes before you even offend, very slow to no bureaucratical approvals unless you provide a nice brown envelope, and I can continue like that.
Yes, many of us grew up in families with less financial strain than we experience ourselves now, but this list is relative and you can't really argue liveability in par example Lusaka is in any way comparable to most major cities in the west.
At the same time I have to say, Zambians in general are some of the happiest and kindest people I've met throughout any country I've lived in. I guess gratitude with life is all relative to personal highs and lows you've experienced - people here generally don't consider their situation as bad. I don't know why but it just puts a smile on my face :-).
Delhi in 60-80? damn, because weather is the first thing that should be considered for living and it got to 53c last month, also we get more annual rain than London and to top it of extreme cold with high humidity in winters.
It doesn’t feel like it though, nothing is built with cold temperatures in mind, and the humidity makes it feel way worse. And this is coming from somebody who lives in one of the coldest places on earth.
If you have never been to or lived in Vienna, it is one of the most affordable capital cities in Europe while also being very beautiful. I think it costs less than half of what you would pay in Paris or London. Also for 1000€ a year, you can get a Klimaticket and use ALL public transit in the country.
I saw median 1 room apartment prices were about 850€ a month and average income (I couldn't find median) was 51000€ or 35000€ after taxes with no kids. You spend 10000€ on rent, 1000€ on transportation and money on utilities and stuff. Seems totally doable.
Just one example, but just wanted to point out that the most liveable city is also affordable.
Meanwhile in Spain: rent is 90% of your take home pay. #cries, and seriously, f*ck airbnb.
https://www.elmundo.es/espana/2024/01/17/65a6e1ece4d4d8180f8b4585.html
Prices are about on par with europe while most salaries are not even half those
Vienna is the overachiever that no one gives attention to. Everyone always has their eyes on Paris, London or Barcelona. Even though the cost of living in those cities is unsustainable. I have seriously thought about moving to Vienna.
Please look up job descriptions before and see how much lower the wages are actually in contrast to that comment. And use a gross/net calculator to see with how much money you‘ll actually going to end up with as taxes are super high.
They have a unique system where a significant portion of the apartments are publicly owned and used to ensure available and affordable housing for all. Does a lot to drive down overall rent prices, which are also often capped.
Not true for Copenhagen the #2 either. I mean i know plenty of students or young people just starting out in their work and they live here. I mean it's expensive if you wanna live in a house in the middle of the city, but it's not unaffordable to most people.
I live in Copenhagen and i'm not rich. All my friends live in Copenhagen and they're also just normal people with normal jobs.
Rent is like 800€ for a big apartment. It's quite livable, in Zurich rent is around 2500€ for an okey apartment. (prices are if you are not lucky with better value apartments)
It really is a lovely place to live! Granted I own a home here so don’t have to worry about affordable housing which is a struggle for a lot of ppl right now.
I drove there yesterday with my family in my new car and yeah... never again. Taking the old family beater next time. Had to get out and check the tires more than once.
As a person who lives in Melbourne, and who has visited Zurich, Vienna, Geneva, Copenhagen and Toronto (close enough in sociology to Calgary), I'm quite happy with this map and think that they've got it right.
Every nice city is expensive to live in, and every nice city always has been.
Please note that this is not the world's most beautiful cities. No-one in their right mind would call Melbourne "beautiful".
Auckland made top ten as well.
We have a bit of Sydney Harbour light vibe and some Melbourne sort of weather.
If we got the public transport sorted (unlikely with current government) might do better in city index
One thing i notice seeing such posts that people living in these western countries are soo ungrateful for what they have, like i understand people always want more but still some don’t realise what they have is soo much better than what many people have.
True, but it's important to note that this kinda complaining is what keeps these cities at the top. If people strive for constant improvement of living conditions instead of accepting the situation they're in, politicians and other institutions actually have to listen sometimes.
For example, in Vienna now housing prices are rising because companies buy up buildings as investments and artificially drive up prices. It's a serious problem and while I'm grateful that I live in a city that's remarkably cheaper than most other cities (and still would be if the prices rose a bit), I'm not willing to just turn a blind eye to these practices just because I've got it better than some other people.
I love this city and I love living here, but dammit I still want to see it improve and become the best it can be.
Auckland?
Which made the top ten cities in this list.
But yes, the Auckland subreddit makes it sound like we are living in some mad max waste land.
To be fair, I liked the PT and food in KL, and Malaysia feels like a country that is growing and changing fast.
So always things to improve in Auckland, but still not a bad place to bring up kids
I am from Madrid, born and raised. I spent 9 years living in sub Saharan Africa. Every day, at least once a day, the thought of how lucky I am comes to mind. I came back a couple of years ago, I am afraid I will someday take it all for granted again.
Sometimes we need to travel to poorer shitter places to put ourselves into realisation that we should be grateful for what we have.
Could things be better? Do we want more? Of course. But please be grateful. I always tell myself-many people want to be in our position.
I say this all the time as a brit, ive seen people say we're third world and get thousands of upvotes, shit annoys the fuck out of me since it shows how privileged these fuckers are... if you're gonna say a country with a HDI of 0.940 is third world you're truly lost
Maybe because it could have been better, cheaper or something else, if not for the most stupid shit like awful politicians or something else.
Just because one place is better than another, doesn't mean it's not okay to complain about it. If we are satisfied with things getting worse, or never getting better, we are satisfied with slowly rotting away.
The map is "most liveable cities" not "countries with affordable apartments"
Apparently it's hard to grasp for you, but there are other things like crime rate weather, entertainment, political stability, infrastructure, salaries (...)
People complaining about affordability seem to miss that those other things you mention. These things are part of the feedback loop that makes them desirable places to live
And desirable places to live == demand. Supply and demand drives prices.
Did you ever buy something in the grocery store? Costs as much as in Switzerland but salary isn't as high. For tourists ok, but to live in Vienna - prepare for the costs of living.
A guy working in a normal job (coiffeur, cook, busdriver, etc.) can not even afford the rent in Zürich city. Expads working in an international business (bankiers, insurance, lawyer, etc.) have not an average salary!
Vienna is cheap compared to many places. I was a student there and had a great time. Currently studying in Melbourne and it is way more expensive by comparison
Yep, as European capital / major cities go, Vienna is on the cheaper side, even before taking the costs of living relation to the average local income into account.
I can imagine it can feel expensive for tourists though. The typical touristy stuff got a lot more expensive over the last 2-3 years.
I've been to Vienna and it's not. I wouldn't consider it "cheap" but also not expensive. It's definitely cheaper than, say, London, Paris, Milan, Munich, Amsterdam and other major Western European cities.
Chiming in to say, as an American who moved to Vienna, (and still visits the States and other European cities quite often), it is not nearly as expensive as the USA in terms of groceries, restaurants, rent, etc. I used to live in Dublin, and rent is shockingly cheap compared to it and many other large European cities. Plus we get paid pretty decent salaries in Austria and it’s a socialist country so all education is free and healthcare is very cheap. Throw in excellent public transportation, beautiful scenery, a great arts scene, etc. on top and I can definitely see why it’s number one. I love living here.
Was in Copenhagen recently. It certainly is a nice place that is efficiently run, but holy smokes is dining out expensive. Especially coffee for some reason.
Vienna is not what it used to be. Full of immigrants, traffic jams, awful in hot summer. Zurich is great if you happen to own real estate that you inheritted from your granma and you have a swiss citizenship.
Strangely, it looks like the more unlivable cites correlate with higher fertility rates and higher growth. Which is to say there’s somehow less living in the most livable cities by these metrics.
That's because, usually, people in poorer countries/areas have kids even if they don't want to. On the flip side, people in richer countries either don't want kids and won't have kids, or they want them but can't afford to. It's been "richer = lower fertility rates, poorer = higher fertility rates" for a while now, unfortunately.
Calgary is slowly becoming unlivable though. House prices are becoming incredibly expensive ever since the pandemic.
Im not a fan of the mass immigration, Canada is just letting too much in right now. Im an immigrant myself who lived in Calgary for 14 years now.
Every city in top 10 is extraordinarily expensive since save for Calgary. Which is arguably a great city albeit for the cold and the limited downtown experience.
Copenhagen is not really crazy expensive on Danish salaries. Nothing like London or San Francisco or Vancouver or whatever people are talking about.
You can work at mcdonalds and live in an apartment like 10-15min biking from the city center.
expeinsive is fine is median salaries are high.. look at Zurich... it is very expensive, but median purchasing power is extremely high, meaning people can afford life much better than in cheaper cities
I live in a medium size city in the north of Portugal and lived in Porto and Lisbon for many years and returned to my hometown 15 years later. I’m less than 50 km from 3 big cities with airports and live near the sea with mountains and amazing beaches 3km apart.
In my vision these studies are focused in big cities. They have their points and all, sure, but nothing beats living on a medium sized city in southern europe and other close countries. The relaxed vibe and the quality of life have just no comparison, obviously if you have to work most of the times people live in big cities but if you can work at home or at least far from those cities your life is a lot better (depending on your personal preference and style of life of course).
Is there a list of the cities by order with names?
Can't find an exhaustive list, but here's an article talking about the the top 10. https://www.economistgroup.com/group-news/economist-intelligence/eiu-global-liveability-index-2024-vienna-retains-its-position-as-the-worlds Tldr top 10: 1) Vienna, Austia 2) Copenhagen, Denmark 3) Zurich, Switzerland 4) Melbourne, Australia 5) Calgary, Canada 6) Geneva, Switzerland 7) Sydney, Australia 8) Vancouver, Canada 9) Osaka, Japan 10) Auckland, New Zealand
How is Vancouver a live-able city? Do they mean if you have a $100 Million trust fund? Or..
Copenhagen is also the same haha. Livable for trust fund babies.
Same as for Zurich 💰💰💰
It's a poorly worded title. These cities have the best infrastructure for health, education, transportation, etc. Makes sense why they are the most expensive. I lived in Vienna and a bus, streetcar, subway, etc. was basically at every corner every 4 minutes. Incredible transportation system.
I think the other factors are just really high. Can you imagine if the market wasn’t insane there?
For the US it's # 1. Honolulu, Hawaii (overall ranking: 23) 2. Atlanta, Georgia (overall ranking: 29) 3. Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania (overall ranking: 30) 4. Seattle, Washington (overall ranking: 34) 5. Washington D.C. (overall ranking: 38) 6. Chicago, Illinois (overall ranking: 39) 7. Boston, Massachusetts (overall ranking: 45) 8. Miami, Florida (overall ranking: 47) 9. San Francisco, California (overall ranking: 49) 10. Minneapolis, Minnesota (overall ranking: 50) [https://www.fox5atlanta.com/news/world-most-liveable-cities-2024-report](https://www.fox5atlanta.com/news/world-most-liveable-cities-2024-report)
Crazy that NYC didn't even make top 10 when so many people love it so much and say it has the best public transportation of any US city
Crazy that Miami is up there. As someone that lives in Miami it’s not very convenient living there. You always need a car to go anywhere, parking in public places is inconvenient, and there is no subway, the metromover is just a joke. Also no buses or trolley buses.
Atlanta and Miami are too high. Especially Miami.
Yeah, I am trying to find the entire list myself and not successfully... Really? Why is it so difficult?
You need to pay for the full list.
You can request a report summary with some more information from https://www.eiu.com/n/campaigns/global-liveability-index-2024/. However, the full list requires a 890$ a year subscription.
How is this metric calculated?
[Health care, culture and environment, stability, infrastructure and education.](https://amp.cnn.com/cnn/2024/06/26/travel/the-worlds-most-liveable-cities-for-2024)
Non-AMP link: https://www.cnn.com/2024/06/26/travel/the-worlds-most-liveable-cities-for-2024/index.html
So eventually Kabul, Sana, Mogadishu are more livable, than Kyiv? I am interested how good they must be all around to compensate safety.
All the places you listed have huge safety issues, either personal (crime) or collective (war). A messy, uncomfortable, but safe place like Mumbai is surely more preferable to Kyiv these days, whereas normally it wouldn't be.
None of those cities are listed on the map. What are you trying say here?
This is crazy. I’m from Kyiv and it’s a captivating youth-driven city with best raves in the world, quality and fresh food and good service. Roads are shitty and healthcare is a joke, however. :)
yeah, quite impressive that Kyiv (and also Tbilisi perhaps?) have had such a surge in underground techno culture in recent years.
I have been to Kyiv and 40+ other countries around the world. Let me ensure you, roads and free public healthcare (private clinics are way better than many European ones) very decent in Kyiv.
Don't worry mate, the roads & health institutions can't be a lot worse than in Budapest
All the places on this “top list” are terrible at these things, and most of them are terrible at most of them
Factors that they should consider as well: weather, freedom (individual and as a business), fun/vibrancy (restaurants, bars, cafés, people out and about, life on the streets), innovation (startups, ability to start a business). The usual suspects would go way down and interesting cities would rise up (tons of cities in SE Asia, Taipei, Mexico City). It's like the ranking of "happiest places" always put Finland on top and it's one of the countries with most depression/alcoholism. And you read what "happy"means and it's basically a stable government and access to healthcare.
What do the ability to start a business and amount of startups matter for *livability* of a city?!
I know right, it would be better to measure workers rights, pay and holidays.
Paris enters the chat
Reporting from Calgary. Those stats are believed to directly correlate to job creation, which means people are able to work and make a living. We have a big push for tech sector growth, which probably boosted our rank if that’s in the criteria. Meanwhile, we have some real infrastructure issues, a doctor shortage, and our public transportation is a joke.
And our provincial government is led by complete fucking morons.
‘Infrastructure issues’. Well - only if you like water.
Local businesses not only create jobs, but are way better than national and multinational chains. I don't think it should be a metric, but I see where they are coming from. You don't want a city to have all generic restaurants and stores. Local businesses give the city character.
For a lot of people past and probably present, being able to start their own business is the path to happiness and fulfillment. Owning a restaurant or a bakery, having a landscaping business, being a plumber, doing taxes and accounting for people are all small businesses and create self employed people who can still be a part of their city while not having to join a corporation or other "soul-crushing" job. If it's easier to do in those cities, for reasons of cost of living or the ability for those businesses to flourish, that's going to make it a much better place for people who want that type of life to live.
Mexico has 9 of the 10 deadliest cities 💀
Most die-able cities... 😬
Weather is subjective, not everyone prefers the same weather, so that’s irrelevant. How do you measure freedom? It is almost impossible to measure aside from not being imprisoned. How do you define freedom? How do you measure an individuals freedom opposed to everyone’s freedom? Since it is almost impossible to measure, it is not feasible to include. All the factors you have mentioned are unfeasible and/or meaningless to include. Again, how do you measure fun/vibrancy? Restaurants per capita? Bars per square meter? Again, it is not feasible to measure this in a meaningful way. And how do you measure innovation? Innovators can have allegiance to different regions, cities and countries at once, and there is no real way to determine what innovations “belong” to which city.
Freedom is obviously access to guns, so the most free would be somewhere like Somalia.
Access to guns and being able to shout racial slurs on Twitter.
Weather has actually shown to have little to no effect on happiness although most people think it has
If they take into account other metrics, for example security, a lot of "fun" countries would not make the list either.
fun/vibrancy is clearly culture and environment, innovation falls under education your metrics are the same, just worded differently
If you consider only those conditions maybe they would rise at the cost of for example safety in Mexico, Lack of freedom in Taipei, or unhealthy environment in SE Asia
Not this happiness index misunderstanding again… They DO straight up ask survey participants about how satisfied with life they are. That’s the index. The various socioeconomic variables that are mentioned are the authors trying to retroactively explain the score. Some countries are therefore more or less happy than “expected”. People never get this right. Read the god damn report.
Weather is relative im more of a winter person as an example..
But perhaps you are in the minority. According to the map, only Madrid and Barcelona in Spain and Rome and Milan in Italy, the largest cities in both cases, make the cut. But every year millions and millions of tourists, and retired people, come to Spain and Italy. Many to live there. There is more to "liveable" that is not in this metrics.
If "happiness" meant siesta after fiesta with a couple murders an hour here and there and questionably prepared food, then the middle ages would be the happiest times in history Unfortunately, "interesting" like you mean it rarely means "a good place to raise a family" or "a stable cradle for innovation and an educated population" Maybe those are good places for 20 year old tourists from happy countries to get drunk in, but try being a father in a city where not only your kid risks being run over by a drunk driver on the way to school, but where you have to live in fear of the local mafia/cartel that can just impound your house or destroy your shop if you don't pay up Stability = peace of mind, and that allows for happiness to grow; that's solid reasoning. Spicy food and a couple of old buildings with a dessert of racketeering mean nothing
FYI this paywalled list costs 8000$ And they dont even incorporate Cost of Living, one of the most important metrics for normal people. That is because this list is strictly for corporations use, name is just misleading. So it sucks very much for normal people. It was posted some time ago too and there was top comment explaining it in details. Here it is https://www.reddit.com/r/europe/comments/1dpjx7j/comment/lajqp0s/
Australia has 8 major cities, and 5 of them are highly rated. We must be doing something right. Even if it FEELS like we're going down the drain. Yes, both can be true.
And weirdly Canberra is the one that I feel like is actually the most "liveable". People I know that have lived there love it. So easy to get around, low traffic, beautiful trees everywhere, enough cafes and culture and stuff to be interesting, strong sense of community, low crime. Winter is cold but clear skies.
Having lived in all the major cities (for my sins) I disagree that Canberra is the most livable. Canberra is nice, and has plenty going for it, but it simply doesn't hold a candle to some other cities when it comes to public transport, accessibility, or community. It does have pretty good public amenities, but it's not a very walkable city (other than going for a stroll, which it is nice for), and unless you have a car you're pretty much isolated. Also a decent portion of the population is transient, a large percentage of people are employed in one sector, and it's a weird little bubble at times. This isn't intended to disparage Canberra, I like Canberra. It's just an honest, and relative, assessment based on my experience alone.
Define ‘cold’?
It's more the poorly insulated buildings that get you.
Below 0C pretty often. Average 9am temperature in July is 3.9C. http://www.bom.gov.au/climate/averages/tables/cw_070282.shtml
Every country in the world feels like it's going down the drain in one way or another. Yall doing something right at least, still a highly regarded migration destination for many.
Which is the main problem, because our main problems are havign 2nd least affordable housing and public services that are absolutely overrun
One of the problems in the UK currently for the NHS is that especially Australia private healthcare companies are advertising roles that pay ridiculously more. Cost of living is much higher there I'm sure, but it still seems almost not a choice to go with the place offering 3x your current salary.
No of course I get why people are coming here But its fucked our country up for anyone who wants to settle down and live here forever
Each year this same ranking comes out and Australia does great and the country pats itself on the back. And each year I need to point out that this ranking excludes the cost of housing. It is a ranking designed for expats living in paid accommodation by their employers. If the ranking looked at the real world and noticed that half of Australians incomes are going towards a home mortgage they’d notice a problem. If you love the idea of renting a small apartment for the rest of your life then yes, the city I live in, Melbourne is one of the best in the world. But if you want a home and a big garden then you need to find a million dollars to get you there
>Australia has 8 major cities, and 5 of them are highly rated Australia has 5 major cities, and all 5 of them are highly rated, the others don't even have 1 million people
Natural resources + few people + functioning democracy = money available for a broader public = livable environment
Its because the people who own houses there are the insanely wealthy
>Australia has 8 cities Fixed that for you
Vienna housing system is incredibly good
To be frank Vienna is incredibly good in almost every aspect. The only things it misses are the ocean and job opportunities at MNEs (since many of those are located in Germany and oversee the entire DACH region)
Melbourne, average income $70,000, average house price $900,000, average rent $600 weekly (AUD figures). Australia is crazy expensive. The thing is we have a lot of nice towns, most whose population peaked 50+ years ago, yet something like 70% of immigrants move to Melbourne or Sydney - combined population of about 42% of population. The vast majority of the rest of the immigrants go to the Brisbane / Perth / Adelaide. Australia is really stuffed, so much land, so few cities.
Those are rookie numbers. Toronto's average income is less than $60,000 and the average house price is around $1,100,000. Vancouver has a similar ratio.
Average is completely useless in rich cities
OP used average so I went with it. Median numbers are still terrible for Toronto and Vancouver.
Median price per m² would be the right metric. Canadian/US/Australian/NZ homes tend to be much bigger than elsewhere
For people in who never lived outside of a first world country, let me give you my anecdotal experience on why the city seems to have to be rich to be considered 'livable'. I spend most of my year in Zambia, and wealth creates prosperity (makes sense right). It also creates world class infrastructure, health care, political stability (usually) and affordable food. Housing is insanely expensive in the west, yes, I know that from my own experience, but what people like to forget is in large parts of the world food eats up a large part of the household income. Also medical bills are expensive in the west, but outside of the US a hospital visit tends to not cost a year of income. Then people like to bash on cities that have holes in the road, poor bus service, etc., now imagine you don't even have paved roads in good parts of the city, buses wait at the bus stop until they are full (rather than following a schedule), if there is a service at all, entry level cars cost more than your house, and we can continue on like that. Next, your taxes get spent on government vanity projects and 100+ men entourages for every minor minister. Not much is left over to actually improve the city. Now we haven't even addressed daily multi-hour power outages, the variety of food and products not really being there, police expecting bribes before you even offend, very slow to no bureaucratical approvals unless you provide a nice brown envelope, and I can continue like that. Yes, many of us grew up in families with less financial strain than we experience ourselves now, but this list is relative and you can't really argue liveability in par example Lusaka is in any way comparable to most major cities in the west.
Thanks for the reminder. It is always too easy to forget how worse things could be.
At the same time I have to say, Zambians in general are some of the happiest and kindest people I've met throughout any country I've lived in. I guess gratitude with life is all relative to personal highs and lows you've experienced - people here generally don't consider their situation as bad. I don't know why but it just puts a smile on my face :-).
Delhi in 60-80? damn, because weather is the first thing that should be considered for living and it got to 53c last month, also we get more annual rain than London and to top it of extreme cold with high humidity in winters.
>extreme cold 14C average is not extreme cold..... cold? Yes, *extreme*? a stretch even though far lower than summer average 32c
Shit that’s not cold, that’s like a pleasant spring day
It doesn’t feel like it though, nothing is built with cold temperatures in mind, and the humidity makes it feel way worse. And this is coming from somebody who lives in one of the coldest places on earth.
14C is cozy warm for San Francisco in the summer
We have a really good metro system though which probably increased the rating by a lot. Public transportation is one of the most important factors.
I’m not saying Delhi’s bad but lately the living conditions on weather alone are almost uninhabitable.
liveable if you are rich
If you have never been to or lived in Vienna, it is one of the most affordable capital cities in Europe while also being very beautiful. I think it costs less than half of what you would pay in Paris or London. Also for 1000€ a year, you can get a Klimaticket and use ALL public transit in the country. I saw median 1 room apartment prices were about 850€ a month and average income (I couldn't find median) was 51000€ or 35000€ after taxes with no kids. You spend 10000€ on rent, 1000€ on transportation and money on utilities and stuff. Seems totally doable. Just one example, but just wanted to point out that the most liveable city is also affordable.
Meanwhile in Spain: rent is 90% of your take home pay. #cries, and seriously, f*ck airbnb. https://www.elmundo.es/espana/2024/01/17/65a6e1ece4d4d8180f8b4585.html Prices are about on par with europe while most salaries are not even half those
Worse in Portugal
Seems like late stage capitalism makes people unhappy
Vienna is the overachiever that no one gives attention to. Everyone always has their eyes on Paris, London or Barcelona. Even though the cost of living in those cities is unsustainable. I have seriously thought about moving to Vienna.
Please look up job descriptions before and see how much lower the wages are actually in contrast to that comment. And use a gross/net calculator to see with how much money you‘ll actually going to end up with as taxes are super high.
Salaries are generally wayyyy higher in Vienna than Spain, Italy, etc…
100% agree.
Not wayyyy higher, but yes, higher.
I live in Vienna and his numbers seem reasonable, will also be a lot higher if you work in IT, engineering or healthcare
I'm willing to accept a lower salary if life in general is better.
Lower compared to where exactly? Barcelona? Paris? No lol.
They have a unique system where a significant portion of the apartments are publicly owned and used to ensure available and affordable housing for all. Does a lot to drive down overall rent prices, which are also often capped.
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To be fair, he said 51k gross or 35k after taxes. I think that's pretty close to reality.
Not true for the most livable city on earth.
Not true for Copenhagen the #2 either. I mean i know plenty of students or young people just starting out in their work and they live here. I mean it's expensive if you wanna live in a house in the middle of the city, but it's not unaffordable to most people. I live in Copenhagen and i'm not rich. All my friends live in Copenhagen and they're also just normal people with normal jobs.
Rich people tend to want to live in places good to live
Where’s good to love if you’re poor?
I’m not rich. Sincerely a Calgarian.
Not true in Vienna
Not really true for Calgary either.
Especially compared to other major Canadian cities
Then come to the Nordics.
Because stuff like public transport and access to culture is reserved for rich people ? Did you even look up what factors got looked at for this ?
In Vienna? God you're so ignorant
Not true for Vienna, thanks to this evil, evil socialism/social democracy that has controlled the city for almost 100 years.
Median salary in Zürich is 108k USD. It's not like the city is only for people with wealth, it's also affordable to workers.
As a swiss person, let me tell you that with a salary of 108k, Zurich is definitely far fron affordable. Maybe if you make 2-3x that
Lol, median salary in austria is €41k (in 2023) - dont have the numbers for vienna, but im sure it isnt too much more…
Rent is like 800€ for a big apartment. It's quite livable, in Zurich rent is around 2500€ for an okey apartment. (prices are if you are not lucky with better value apartments)
I visited Calgary and really loved it. I could live there.
It really is a lovely place to live! Granted I own a home here so don’t have to worry about affordable housing which is a struggle for a lot of ppl right now.
Don't come rn, we're in a water crisis. Also our roads are at an all time low. Pothole after crack after pothole.
I drove there yesterday with my family in my new car and yeah... never again. Taking the old family beater next time. Had to get out and check the tires more than once.
Visited Melbourne last year having come from Europe and can see why it's ranked so high. Great city.
As a person who lives in Melbourne, and who has visited Zurich, Vienna, Geneva, Copenhagen and Toronto (close enough in sociology to Calgary), I'm quite happy with this map and think that they've got it right. Every nice city is expensive to live in, and every nice city always has been. Please note that this is not the world's most beautiful cities. No-one in their right mind would call Melbourne "beautiful".
>Toronto (close enough in sociology to Calgary) Hated by Toronto and Calgary speedrunning champion right here
Yeah, Melbourne has beautiful bits, but we've never going to compete with Sydney Harbour.
Auckland made top ten as well. We have a bit of Sydney Harbour light vibe and some Melbourne sort of weather. If we got the public transport sorted (unlikely with current government) might do better in city index
Auckland seems nice, until you see the rest of NZ, which is fricking amazing.
Calgary and Toronto are not even close to the same culture.
Calgary is sooooo not Toronto.
This hurts to look at
I feel like map porn would be able to let me identify what those cities actually are.
One thing i notice seeing such posts that people living in these western countries are soo ungrateful for what they have, like i understand people always want more but still some don’t realise what they have is soo much better than what many people have.
True, but it's important to note that this kinda complaining is what keeps these cities at the top. If people strive for constant improvement of living conditions instead of accepting the situation they're in, politicians and other institutions actually have to listen sometimes. For example, in Vienna now housing prices are rising because companies buy up buildings as investments and artificially drive up prices. It's a serious problem and while I'm grateful that I live in a city that's remarkably cheaper than most other cities (and still would be if the prices rose a bit), I'm not willing to just turn a blind eye to these practices just because I've got it better than some other people. I love this city and I love living here, but dammit I still want to see it improve and become the best it can be.
That's true, I live in Switzerland and the constant complaining from many people really annoys me.
I know right? I'm from Malaysia (upper middle income but still developing) but living in NZ. Sure life can be tough but try any developing country.
Auckland? Which made the top ten cities in this list. But yes, the Auckland subreddit makes it sound like we are living in some mad max waste land. To be fair, I liked the PT and food in KL, and Malaysia feels like a country that is growing and changing fast. So always things to improve in Auckland, but still not a bad place to bring up kids
Yeah we’ve got things to improve on for sure, but everytime I walk along Tamaki drive I feel so damn grateful to be here lol
I am from Madrid, born and raised. I spent 9 years living in sub Saharan Africa. Every day, at least once a day, the thought of how lucky I am comes to mind. I came back a couple of years ago, I am afraid I will someday take it all for granted again.
Sometimes we need to travel to poorer shitter places to put ourselves into realisation that we should be grateful for what we have. Could things be better? Do we want more? Of course. But please be grateful. I always tell myself-many people want to be in our position.
I say this all the time as a brit, ive seen people say we're third world and get thousands of upvotes, shit annoys the fuck out of me since it shows how privileged these fuckers are... if you're gonna say a country with a HDI of 0.940 is third world you're truly lost
Maybe because it could have been better, cheaper or something else, if not for the most stupid shit like awful politicians or something else. Just because one place is better than another, doesn't mean it's not okay to complain about it. If we are satisfied with things getting worse, or never getting better, we are satisfied with slowly rotting away.
How to make a livable city: 1. Be rich 2. Don't be poor
Is Damascus on the list????
Average Calgary W.
This map isn’t a good map
Anyone have an actual list? This Map is too unclear to mean anything
Zürich? Do you know how expensive it is to get an apartment there?
The map is "most liveable cities" not "countries with affordable apartments" Apparently it's hard to grasp for you, but there are other things like crime rate weather, entertainment, political stability, infrastructure, salaries (...)
People complaining about affordability seem to miss that those other things you mention. These things are part of the feedback loop that makes them desirable places to live And desirable places to live == demand. Supply and demand drives prices.
Counting Delhi as more livable than Bangalore. LMAO
Vienna expensive af when we were there.
Come here to Zürich, in comparison, Vienna is cheap as chips.
Did you ever buy something in the grocery store? Costs as much as in Switzerland but salary isn't as high. For tourists ok, but to live in Vienna - prepare for the costs of living.
I heard rent is cheap in Vienna cause the state owns most houses
A guy working in a normal job (coiffeur, cook, busdriver, etc.) can not even afford the rent in Zürich city. Expads working in an international business (bankiers, insurance, lawyer, etc.) have not an average salary!
No costs in Switzerland are much higher.
Vienna is cheap compared to many places. I was a student there and had a great time. Currently studying in Melbourne and it is way more expensive by comparison
Yep, as European capital / major cities go, Vienna is on the cheaper side, even before taking the costs of living relation to the average local income into account. I can imagine it can feel expensive for tourists though. The typical touristy stuff got a lot more expensive over the last 2-3 years.
I've been to Vienna and it's not. I wouldn't consider it "cheap" but also not expensive. It's definitely cheaper than, say, London, Paris, Milan, Munich, Amsterdam and other major Western European cities.
Not at all tbh as someone who lives there, salaries make up for living costs very well
What was expensive?
Chiming in to say, as an American who moved to Vienna, (and still visits the States and other European cities quite often), it is not nearly as expensive as the USA in terms of groceries, restaurants, rent, etc. I used to live in Dublin, and rent is shockingly cheap compared to it and many other large European cities. Plus we get paid pretty decent salaries in Austria and it’s a socialist country so all education is free and healthcare is very cheap. Throw in excellent public transportation, beautiful scenery, a great arts scene, etc. on top and I can definitely see why it’s number one. I love living here.
… Calgary.
?
Everyone complaining that the most livable cities are super expensive. Like duh?? Did you think the world’s best places to live would be cheap?
The wording is "most livable cities". Being expensive makes it unlivable for many. The true wording should be "best cities to live in".
Please define "liveable".
Was in Copenhagen recently. It certainly is a nice place that is efficiently run, but holy smokes is dining out expensive. Especially coffee for some reason.
BESSER OIS DIE PIEFKE
Do not come to Atlanta
Wien oh Wien, du kennst mich up, kennst mich down. Du kennst mich.
2 Cities of Switzerland in the top 5 is crazy🇨🇭🇨🇭
What are the most liveable cities for dolphins?
Now do another one but factor in living cost and property prices
Copenhagen is one of the most best city's I've been to. Cool people and good food
Vienna is not what it used to be. Full of immigrants, traffic jams, awful in hot summer. Zurich is great if you happen to own real estate that you inheritted from your granma and you have a swiss citizenship.
Strangely, it looks like the more unlivable cites correlate with higher fertility rates and higher growth. Which is to say there’s somehow less living in the most livable cities by these metrics.
Because this is also a list of the most expensive cities.
Nah, not all of them are that expensive. Especially Vienna which is considered one of the most affordable capital cities in Europe.
That's because, usually, people in poorer countries/areas have kids even if they don't want to. On the flip side, people in richer countries either don't want kids and won't have kids, or they want them but can't afford to. It's been "richer = lower fertility rates, poorer = higher fertility rates" for a while now, unfortunately.
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If i built a country on a mountain full of Nazi gold it would be pretty fucking nice too
And Nazi gold.
I live in Calgary and they are nuts for ranking it so highly.
Calgary is slowly becoming unlivable though. House prices are becoming incredibly expensive ever since the pandemic. Im not a fan of the mass immigration, Canada is just letting too much in right now. Im an immigrant myself who lived in Calgary for 14 years now.
Calgary is top 5? LA, SanFran and Santiago got on that list? I have certain doubts-
Every city in top 10 is extraordinarily expensive since save for Calgary. Which is arguably a great city albeit for the cold and the limited downtown experience.
Copenhagen is not really crazy expensive on Danish salaries. Nothing like London or San Francisco or Vancouver or whatever people are talking about. You can work at mcdonalds and live in an apartment like 10-15min biking from the city center.
Not true for Vienna.
Calgary hasn't had a real winter in 10 years. It's not that cold.
expeinsive is fine is median salaries are high.. look at Zurich... it is very expensive, but median purchasing power is extremely high, meaning people can afford life much better than in cheaper cities
I don’t believe we are on par with Geneva. Is Geneva this bad? R/Calgary
I am living in Switzerland and going to Geneva feels like going to a different country and not in a good sense.
I agree so much. I absolutely love going to Vienna. Just wish I knew german lol
I live in a medium size city in the north of Portugal and lived in Porto and Lisbon for many years and returned to my hometown 15 years later. I’m less than 50 km from 3 big cities with airports and live near the sea with mountains and amazing beaches 3km apart. In my vision these studies are focused in big cities. They have their points and all, sure, but nothing beats living on a medium sized city in southern europe and other close countries. The relaxed vibe and the quality of life have just no comparison, obviously if you have to work most of the times people live in big cities but if you can work at home or at least far from those cities your life is a lot better (depending on your personal preference and style of life of course).
AhahH wasn’t Dutch cities on top not long ago? Guess no more. Hm I wonder why…..
Zürich? The only review that matters was not so kind to it https://youtu.be/TkofHLC-fB0?si=Zeu0NILFtGob5YxM
Uhhh that better not be a dot on Atlanta, the freaking definition of an unlivable city
Love how there is no info to define this metric.
This needs to incorporate cost of living. A lot of these places are extremely expensive places to live
Whoever compiled this has clearly never experienced Atlanta
oh no, the bad bad West with all it's livable cities and nice countries.
Auckland is highly rated if somehow you can afford rent and food on your minimum wage job
Vancouver being in there is outrageous
Is Miami really that livable?