Toronto was just ranked one of the top 20 best cities in the world

The latest ranking of the world’s best cities is out, and some may be surprised by where Toronto landed on the list. World’sBestCities.com did what it does best and ranked the world’s top urban destinations. Although no Canadian city made the top 10, Toronto ranked an impressive 15th out of 100 cities globally.

The 2024 report marks Toronto’s second-highest ranking on the list since its inception a decade ago — in the past two years, the city even dropped out of the top 20, placing in spot 23 in 2023 and spot 24 in 2022, compared to its 18th place ranking in 2021 and record high of 13th place in 2020.

The report said that Toronto is “Canada’s gateway for skilled immigrants,” and noted how half the population was born outside the country.

“Toronto’s skyline is buzzing with development—221 cranes tower above the city, more than four times that of second-place L.A,” the report stated, adding how the construction boom has reshaped the downtown core, everything from revitalized cultural landmarks like Massey Hall to the new Renzo Piano-designed Ontario Court of Justice. (Nobody tell them that all those cranes haven’t exactly made a dent in the city’s housing crisis yet!)

The report noted that the addition of Love Park (with its heart-shaped pond) adds greenery to the city’s core. Notably, the city ranked third in the world in terms of “tree cover,” which measures the share of a city’s land that is covered in vegetation (at least 16 feet in height, with a canopy cover greater than 50 per cent).

The city is also being praised for its infrastructure, with the report referencing the St. Lawrence Centre for the Arts’ $400-million transformation to become Canada’s first carbon-neutral theater when it reopens in 2028. And as we previously reported, next June, Live Nation is set to debut Rogers Stadium at the site of the former Downsview Airport — it’ll be a massive, open-air venue sprawled across a 370-acre site that will hold up to 50,000 attendees! Although the stadium is intended as a temporary solution to meet the rising demand for live entertainment, it’ll operate for five years before undergoing a $30-billion redevelopment into 15 new transit-oriented communities.

The report also highlights the city’s waterfront.

“[T]he $1.3-billion Port Lands Flood Protection Project and the new Villiers Island, formed by the reimagined Don River mouth, is poised to be the crown jewel of the development. The reclamation of the city’s neglected lakefront was long overdue,” the report adds.

The report, conducted by consultancy firm Resonance, evaluated global cities using a detailed methodology — researchers analyzed cities with populations of over 1 million based on both hard data and user-generated data from online sources, like Google, Tripadvisor and Instagram. Scores were based on three main categories: liability (the quality of both natural and built environments), lovability (the vibrancy and cultural richness of a city) and prosperity (economic strength). The results were also based on survey data from over 22,000 respondents worldwide.

It may come as no surprise that London, England, took the top spot, followed by New York, U.S., Paris, France and Tokyo, Japan, with Singapore in Southeast Asia rounding out the top 5.

Other Canadian cities to make the list include Vancouver (no. 22), Montreal (no. 35), Ottawa (no. 52), Calgary (no. 54) and Edmonton (no. 65).

These are the top 20 cities in the world