London won the overall ranking and ranked top in seven of the 28 subcategories such as nightlife, Instagram hashtags and museums.
New York was ranked second, followed by Paris, Tokyo and Singapore in fifth. Australia just made the top 10 list, with Sydney in 10th place.
Aotearoa didn’t make the top 10, or the top 20. Our biggest city, Auckland, ranked just inside the top 50 at 47th, up from last year’s 64th spot.
Auckland was ranked the best city in the world for air quality and the sixth best for labour force participation.
“New Zealand’s largest and most cosmopolitan city balances modernity with natural beauty,” read the entry. It also said the renewed Britomart and Viaduct Harbour, as well as the new Commercial Bay area, have “transformed” the city’s downtown area.
It also called out the City Rail Link, saying it would “dramatically improve transit connectivity across the city” once it’s complete in 2026.
While it was the 16th most “livable” city, it was not particularly “lovable” or “prosperous”, ranking 69th and 99th, respectively.
Prosperity reflects the relative strength of human capital and was calculated using several metrics, such as GDP per capita, labour force participation, percentage of the population with a bachelor’s degree and poverty rate.
Auckland did rank sixth in labour force participation but seemingly performed poorly in the other metrics, relative to other major cities.
London was also rated the most ‘lovable’ city. “Lovability speaks to the relative vibrancy and quality of place of a city relative to its competitive set,” the report stated. Metrics for this category included the number of concerts, bars, clubs, attractions, and museums rated higher than four stars on Tripadvisor, plus the total number of restaurants, number of Instagram posts with the location hashtag, popularity on Google Trends and survey results from international respondents.
Of the 10 most “lovable” cities, most were in Europe, including Paris (2), Rome (5), Barcelona (6), Madrid (7) and Berlin (9).
1. London
2. New York
3. Paris
4. Tokyo
5. Singapore
6. Rome
7. Madrid
8. Barcelona
9. Berlin
10. Sydney
11. Amsterdam
12. San Francisco
13. Dubai
14. Los Angeles
15. Toronto
16. Seoul
17. Chicago
18. Vienna
19. Seattle
20. Milan