Haifa Ranks Among World's Happiest Cities in New Index
Translated & summarized from Maariv by baba
Haifa has been recognized in the 2026 Happy City Index, ranking among the top 250 cities globally for quality of life. The index highlights Haifa's strengths in life expectancy and employment while noting areas for improvement in recycling and green space.
The story in 5 lines · by baba
- Haifa ranked among the top 250 happiest cities globally in the 2026 index.
- The index measures urban well-being using 64 indicators across six domains.
- Haifa excels in life expectancy, low unemployment, and foreign language proficiency.
- Areas needing improvement include recycling rates and green space per capita.
- Copenhagen, Denmark, was named the world's happiest city in the ranking.
The Israeli city of Haifa has been included in the 2026 Happy City Index, a global ranking that assesses urban quality of life and well-being. Haifa secured a spot among the top 250 cities worldwide after a rigorous selection process that began with over 3,400 cities. The index evaluates 64 indicators across six domains: residents, governance, environment, economy, health, and mobility.
Haifa's performance highlights several strengths, including a life expectancy of 83.2 years, significantly higher than the average of 81.26 years among surveyed cities. The city also boasts a lower unemployment rate of 3.3% compared to the index average of 5.58%, and a higher proportion of residents holding master's degrees (17.1% versus 12.4%). Additionally, Haifa excels in foreign language proficiency, with 85% of its population able to communicate in a foreign language, well above the average of 34.14%. Its GDP per capita is also higher than the average, reaching £40,745 compared to £36,208.
Despite these achievements, the index also points to areas where Haifa lags behind. Its recycling rate is only 16.8%, substantially lower than the average of 44.29%. The city also shows higher average annual concentrations of PM2.5 (16.2 versus 11.86) and a lower ratio of green space per capita (47.54 compared to 72.57). Road traffic accidents per thousand residents are also higher at 11.73 compared to the average of 8.13.
Copenhagen, Denmark, topped the 2026 Happy City Index, followed by Helsinki, Finland, and Geneva, Switzerland. Tokyo was the only non-European city to make the top ten. Cities at the bottom of the ranking included Rabat, Morocco, and Guadalajara, Mexico, which ranked last at 250th. Kyiv was included symbolically without a score as a gesture of solidarity due to the ongoing war in Ukraine.
The Happy City Index is developed by researchers from the Institute for Quality of Life and Happy City Hub Ltd. The 2026 edition involved 466 researchers and approximately 150,000 data records. The index organizers emphasize that the results are for informational and comparative purposes and should not be considered definitive.
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