London tops World’s Best Cities 2025, Indian cities fail to make ranking

London: London has topped a definitive ranking of the World’s Best Cities 2025 released on Wednesday for the tenth year in a row, followed closely by New York and Paris, even as Indian cities failed to make the cut based on the criteria of perception and performance.

The annual rankings produced by Resonance Consultancy in partnership with Ipsos are an analysis of large urban regions around the world that are leading in aspects most important to attracting workforce, visitors, and businesses.

The 2025 report marks a first in incorporating perception-based data by surveying more than 22,000 people in 31 countries for the first time – the results of which also demonstrate that people all over the world still very much aspire to live, visit, and work in the world’s largest cities.

“Mumbai and Delhi are just outside of the top 100; those cities in the Asia Pacific context are in the top but at a global scale don't make the top 100,” Chris Fair, President & CEO of Resonance Consultancy, told PTI in response to a question at the launch of the report in London.

“Mumbai and Delhi have some particular strengths, but they have some particular weaknesses from a livability perspective relative to these other cities and from a livability perspective as well. But in our Asia-Pacific report in February, they are in the top 20,” he said.

The World's Best Cities ranking is drawn up on “livability”, or the physical sense of a city based on the quality of its natural and built environments; “lovability”, or the quality of life in terms of culture, dining and nightlife; and “prosperity”, or the human capital of a city and the support it receives to thrive. The goal is to create the most comprehensive and holistic approach to measuring and benchmarking both perception and performance of the cities.

“London continues to set the bar for what a truly great city should be,” said Laura Citron, CEO of London & Partners, the UK capital’s growth agency.

“Our iconic attractions, world-class financial sector, and fast-growing tech industry are proof of our city’s strength. But it’s the diversity of our people and ideas that drives the innovation, opportunities, and progress that shape our future. No city embodies this quite like London,” she said.

After London (UK), New York (US) and Paris (France), Tokyo (Japan), Singapore, Rome (Italy), Madrid (Spain), Barcelona (Spain), Berlin (Germany) and Sydney (Australia) complete the top 10.

While the United States is in the lead with 36 cities in the Top 100, Canada comes in a distant second with six cities and Cape Town and Rio de Janeiro make a mark as new entrants to the 2025 ranking.

“The phrase ‘perception is reality’ is often used when developing reputation management strategies for companies, but the same holds true for destinations. By merging the top-of-mind destinations where people tell us they want to live, work, and visit with the rigorous evaluation of place that Resonance has been conducting for nearly a decade, we have created a more comprehensive evaluation of cities and can better advise destinations on how to strengthen their reputation,” said Jason McGrath, Executive Vice President at Ipsos.

The overall World’s Best Cities rankings are determined by analysing public perception, combined with a wide range of factors that have demonstrated moderate to strong correlations with attracting prime age population (aged 25-44), visitor expenditure, and/or business formation. The key takeaway from the latest analysis is of the strength and resilience of some of the world’s large cities.