Singapore Named World’s Most Expensive City to Live in for The 9th Time in 11 Years

Singapore has been named the world’s most expensive city to live in by the Worldwide Cost of Living survey by The Economist Intelligence Unit (EIU), the research and analysis division of The Economist Group.

Singapore shares the top spot with Switzerland’s Zurich. This is the second consecutive time that Singapore has maintained its pole position in the survey.

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In fact, Singapore has been in pole position a whopping 9 times over the past 11 years in the survey, topping the survey again for the latest iteration of the Worldwide Cost of Living survey, which is for the year 2023.

Here are the top 10 most expensive places to live in the world according to the survey:

1. Singapore
2. Zurich, Switzerland (joint 1st)
3. Geneva, Switzerland
4. New York City, USA
5. Hong Kong
6. Los Angeles, USA
7. Paris, France
8. Copenhagen, Denmark
9. Tel Aviv, Israel
10. San Francisco, USA

In the 2022 version of the survey, Singapore was joint top with New York, while Tel Aviv, Hong Kong, and Los Angeles made up the top five.

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In 2021, Singapore was ranked joint second with Paris, with Tel Aviv taking the top spot as the world’s most expensive city to live in. Zurich and Hong Kong completed the top five list for that year.

EIU’s Worldwide Cost of Living survey

In this latest iteration of the survey, the EIU found that on average, prices increased by 7.4% yearly in local currency terms.

Furthermore, price growth has slowed from the 8.1% reported in the 2022 version of the survey but remains significantly above the trend from 2017 to 2021.

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As for the methodology used, the Worldwide Cost of Living survey is conducted twice yearly by the EIU and compares more than 400 individual prices across 200 products and services in 173 cities.

The survey has been carried out for over 30 years, with the data collected each March and September by the EIU’s researchers. They are then compiled into an index.

To gather the price data, the EIU surveyed a range of stores, including supermarkets, mid-priced stores, and higher-priced specialty outlets, as well as an array of service providers. The reported prices are not the recommended retail prices or manufacturers’ costs but the actual costs charged.

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What do you think of the survey’s findings? Share your thoughts with us in the comments!

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