Woo! Melbourne has ranked sixth in a new global list of the best cities by economic experts
The 2025 Global Cities Index assesses 1,000 of the largest cities worldwide in determining the rankings, and Melbourne was named sixth in the whole wide world. Our city jumped up from ninth place in 2024, proving that it continues to go from strength to strength.
To compile the rankings, researchers at Oxford Economics scored each city on 27 indicators across five categories, including Economics, Human Capital, Quality of Life, Environment and Governance. Cities were scored under each of these pillars, then the results were combined to reveal the world's top-performing cities overall.
Melbourne once again took the crown as the highest-ranking Australian city and overtook heavyweights like San Francisco, Los Angeles and Tokyo. The Victorian capital truly shone in the Human Capital category, where it ranked 12th globally – largely thanks to its high-quality universities and fast-growing economy that's attracted many foreign workers. Melbourne also secured a spot in the top 20 cities for Economics, ranked in the top ten per cent for Environment and tied with Sydney as Australia's highest-ranked city for Governance in 15th place.
Topping the entire list was New York in the United States, followed by London, then Paris – a predictable top three. San Jose (the home of Silicon Valley) came in at the fourth spot in the rankings, followed by Seattle rounding out the top five.
The report flagged that some of Melbourne's top strengths contributing to its high ranking were its world-class healthcare system, low crime rate, low environmental emissions, stable climate and the multicultural population. But it did also highlight that one of our city's main weaknesses is the increasingly unaffordable housing prices (as is the case in most Australian cities), due to the fast-growing population.
Sydney followed very closely behind on the list, ranking seventh in the world, making an impressive jump from 16th place, and Brisbane was ranked 23rd, Perth and Canberra dropped slightly compared to their placings in 2024, coming in at the 31st and 52nd spots respectively.
You can find a full list of Australia's rankings in Oxford Economics' Global Cities Index here.
The 2025 top ten cities in the world, according to the Oxford Economics Global Cities Index:
New York, United States
London, England
Paris, France
San Jose, United States
Seattle, United States
Melbourne, Australia
Sydney, Australia
Boston, United States
Tokyo, Japan
San Francisco, United States
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