These Are the World’s Most Reputable Cities in 2018

Toronto and Vancouver continue their fall from grace.

Just two weeks after being ousted as Canada’s most liveable cities by Calgary, Toronto and Vancouver – perennial number ones in such rankings – have been outdone by Montreal in reputation.

According to the very official Reputation Institute, Montreal is the world’s 10th-most reputable city. Toronto placed 13th, while Vancouver dropped from its usual perch in the top 10 to register an unflattering 16th-place finish. Montreal scored especially high for safety and security, which Toronto certainly did not. Both Toronto and Vancouver also suffered from poor scores in cultural diversity and entertainment – “a tad more ordinary, and perhaps a little less progressive in terms of their policy agenda,” according to Chief Reputation Officer Stephen Hahn-Griffiths. (Yes, that’s a real title).

Toronto remains Canada’s highest-ever representative on the list, finishing second in 2013.

A point of national pride, Montreal, Toronto, and Vancouver all placed ahead of the United States’ top representative, San Francisco, which ranked 20th.

Determining the ranking was a pretty straightforward procedure. More than 12,000 people living in G8 member countries – Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, Russia, the U.K. and the U.S. – were asked to score cities based on a variety of emotional and rational factors (not all cities included in the survey are located in a G8 country). Basically, they were asked, “What do you think of this city?”

It turns out people hold Tokyo in the highest regard. The Japanese capital climbed 11 spots from last year to top this year’s ranking. Sydney took runner-up honours, while Copenhagen has the world’s third-best reputation. Vienna and Stockholm round out the top five, respectively.

Moscow, meanwhile, has the worst reputation of the 53 cities included in the survey, edging out Cairo and Mexico City.