Sydney ranked as best city in the world, second behind Singapore in ‘friendliest’ in new list

Sydney has been voted as the best city in the world – and also ranked second to Singapore as being the “friendliest.”

The NSW capital just got more reasons to brag after it topped Condé Nast Traveler’s “world’s best” list, cementing its spot as one of the world’s premier tourist destinations.

The Readers’ Choice Awards 2024 had more than 125,000 readers across the UK vote for the prestigious gong. Sydney came out on top with a score of 92.96 for its “unique, indoor-outdoor way of life”.

The city of Valencia in Spain came in second with a score of 92.78, followed by Singapore (92.47), Hong Kong (91.72) and Stockholm in Sweden (91.11).

“If you’ve experienced a snippet of life Down Under, you’ve probably fallen hard for the unique, indoor-outdoor way of life the Aussies embrace so well,” Traveller said about Sydney.

The age-old debate – and ‘friendly’ banter between states – on whether Sydney or Melbourne is better has finally been settled, according to the publication, with Sydney beating its rival.

Sorry, Melbourne — the people have spoken and you didn’t make the cut.

In a somewhat surprising development, Sydney was also named the second-friendliest city in the world to visit with a score of 93.85, behind Singapore (94.84) in first place, with Las Vegas, Nevada securing the third spot.

Melbourne? Again, not on the list. But they did pretty well in a bunch of other categories.

The Langham hotel in Melbourne came in tenth in the Best Hotels in Australasia category.

It was, however, the popular Sydney hotel, The Fullerton, located in the CBD that came out on top. The Park Hyatt Sydney came in second, while Halcyon House at Cabarita Beach came in third place and The Calile Hotel in Brisbane secured fourth place.

As a country, however, Australia cleaned up in several other categories with Southern Ocean Lodge on Kangaroo Island named 29th in the Best Hotels in the World list, and the only Australian hotel to be named in the top 50.

The hotel burned down in the black summer bushfires in 2020 and was rebuilt in 2023. L’Horizon Resort & Spa in Palm Springs, California took out the top gong in that category.

Conde Nast Traveler US also unveiled its Readers’ Choice Awards this week, with Sydney placing third in its list of the best cities in the world, describing it as “an ideal getaway no matter the season”.

Melburnians will be pleased to know the Ritz-Carlton Melbourne was named the best hotel in Australia and New Zealand for 2024 in the US award – so that’s another thing they can brag about.

The winners were chosen based on the votes of more than half-a-million survey respondents.

The publication also had readers vote on their favourite airlines with Air New Zealand coming first, followed Singapore Airlinesm Qatair Airways, Emirates and British Airways. No Aussie carrier made the top 12 cut.

Meanwhile, in September, Sydney was named Oceania’s Leading City Destination in the World Travel Awards 2024.

However, while Sydney continues to rake up several prestigious awards, according to the most recent International Visitor Survey data from Tourism Research Australia, the city welcomed 3,446,000 foreign visitors in June, a figure still 16 per cent below the same period in 2019.

John O’Sullivan, chief executive of Experience Co and former Tourism Australia managing director, told the Sydney Morning Herald, the stellar awards results could go a long way to putting Sydney on the radar of high-value international travellers – that is, those likely to spend more, stay longer and travel further within Australia.