Danish capital still most liveable

Copenhagen, the home of Innovation District Copenhagen, remains the world’s most liveable city in 2026. This, according to an annual analysis made by media house Economist’s “EIU Global Liveability Index “. Copenhagen leads Vienna (Austria) and Melbourne (Australia), which are in second and third place respectively. This is the third time, and the second year running, that Copenhagen takes first place.

Used for decisions on investments and operations

Investors and multinational organisations often use the Liveability Index to benchmark cities for purposes such as investment decisions or expatriate relocation packages. The ranking also offers an independent, data-driven signal of a city’s stability, quality of life and functioning infrastructure. This is highly useful for international stakeholders assessing where to locate operations, talent or partnerships.

Measured on five categories

EIU’s Global Liveability Index assesses 173 cities across the world across 30 indicators grouped into five categories: stability, healthcare, culture and environment, education, and infrastructure, with the aim of showing how comfortable these cities are to live in.
What is liveability? The concept of liveability is simple: it assesses which locations around the world provide the best or the worst living conditions. Every city is assigned a rating of relative comfort for more than 30 qualitative and quantitative factors across five broad categories:

• Stability: Crime, civil unrest or military conflict.
• Healthcare: Availability of private and public healthcare and over the counter drugs.
• Culture and environment: Weather, corruption, censorship, food and entertainment.
• Education: Availability and quality of private and public education.
• Infrastructure. Quality and availability of road, rail, housing, energy, telecommunications, and water.

Top ten competition very close

In the latest edition of the survey, conducted in May 2026, Copenhagen (Denmark) retained pole position for the second year running, scoring a perfect 100 out of 100 in three categories and above 95 in the other two, with Vienna (Austria) and Melbourne (Australia) close behind. Vancouver (Canada), which had led the index for many years, is the only North American city represented. All of the top ten have perfect scores for education, with most also scoring 100 for healthcare provision.