Vienna remains the highest-rated city in the world in terms of quality of life, according to the annual report by Economist Intelligence Unit (EIU).
However, Bucharest has also made a mark as it is among the cities with the highest year-on-year growth. It now ranks 94th, up 5 positions.
Here is the top 10:
And here is the list of cities that have shown the most improvement compared to the most recent ranking:
The study covers 173 cities, each being assigned a comfort rating based on 30 qualitative and quantitative factors organized into five major categories: stability, healthcare, culture and environment, education, and infrastructure.
Each factor in a city is evaluated as acceptable, tolerable, uncomfortable, undesirable, or intolerable.
Western Europe remains the region with the best quality of life. From here, we have Vienna, Copenhagen, Zurich, and Geneva in the top ten cities.
The 30 Western European cities in the overall ranking reported an impressive average score of 92 out of 100.
Nevertheless, the region experienced the largest score decrease due to a deterioration in the stability category, which is also the most significant factor contributing to the decline across all categories analyzed globally.
The conflict between Israel and Hamas caused Tel Aviv to have the largest drop in the ranking, falling 20 places to position 112.
Here is the list of cities that have shown the least improvement compared to the most recent ranking:
And finally, the bottom of the ranking, with Tripoli (Libya) and Damascus (Syria) at the last positions:
The quality of life has improved on average worldwide, but "this improvement is marginal due to geopolitical conflicts, social unrest, and a housing crisis," as stated in the study by EIU.