Full list of the world's 10 best cities to live in - top 3 all in Europe
The Economist Intelligence Unit's annual Global Liveability Index has been announced, evaluating 173 cities, with European cities claiming all three top spots.
The Economist Intellience Unit's annual Global Liveability Index has been announced, evaluating 173 cities, with European cities claiming all three top spots.
(Image: Getty)The world's 10 best cities to live in, according to The Economist Intelligence Unit's (EIU) annual Global Liveability Index 2024 have been revealed. The index evaluates 173 cities across categories such as stability, healthcare, culture and environment, education and infrastructure.
Compared with previous years, the average livability scores have varied by very little in 2024, by just 0.06 points. The EIU said: "Declines in stability and infrastructure across a number of cities in advanced economies were offset by structural improvements in healthcare and education in several cities in developing markets".
The EIU also noted that stability has registered the biggest decline of all the five categories in the index, while the war with Hamas has pulled Tel Aviv (Israel) down by 20 places to be the biggest faller in this year’s index.
The top cities, however, remain remarkably similar to last year. Four European cities made the top 10 list, along with four Asia-Pacific and two Canadian cities this time around. Western Europe maintained its position as the most liveable region, coming top in four categories except education. 30 cities reported an impressive average score of 92 out of 100, but the overall score has slipped since last year amid instances of disrutpive protests and crime.
Toronto, Canada, is the only city to be dropped from the list, due to falling infrastructure scores amid its growing housing crisis.
No new cities have entered the list, as Osaka and Auckland maintained their statuses having tied last year.
The large metropolitan city in the North Island of New Zealand, Auckland achieved the first of the top 10 positions.
It achieved a perfect score in education, with scores of 97.9 for culture and environment and 95.8 for healthcare.
Overall, it scored 96.0, tied with the ninth place city Japanese city.
It is the most populous city in the country, with a total population of over 1.7 million. It has the fourth largest foreign-born population in the world at 39 percent. It's central business district is the most built-up area of the region, covering a triangular area of 1,070 acres.
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Tied with an overall score of 96.0 was one of the three major cities of Japan, Osaka. It is the third-most populous city in Japan, following the special wards of Tokyo and Yokohama.
It is also the 10th-largest urban area in the world, with more than 19 million inhabitants.
It receieved perfect scores in the stability, healthcare and education categories, but was largely dragged down by the culture and environment category, only being awarded 86.8.
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The Canadian city of Vancouver earned joint seventh place with an overall score of 96.6.
It recieved perfect scores in the categories of healthcare and education and 96.4 in infrastructure. This latter category had its score pulled down from last year due to an acute housing crisis.
Vancouver is a major city in western Canada, located in the Lower Mainland region of British Colombia. It is the most populous city in the province and it has the highest population density in the country, with over 15,000 inhabitants per square mile.
In terms of housing affordability, Vancouver is among one of the most expensive cities in Canada and in the world, according to CTV News.
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The capital of the state of New South Wales, Sydney, also earned joint seventh place. It achieved perfect scores in the healthcare and education categories and 96.4 in infrastructure.
Again, like Vancouver, an acute housing crisis pulled down scores in the latter category.
Sydney is the most populous city in Australia, located on the east coast and surrounding the iconic Sydney Harbour. It's nicknames include "The Emerald City" and the "Harbour City". As of June 2023, its population was estimated to be just under 5,450,500.
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