I just realized that the most expensive city in the world isn’t in the USA—it’s in Switzerland. Zurich leads the ranking with 112.5 points, about 12.5% more expensive than New York. It’s pretty wild, considering NYC has long been seen as the benchmark. Geneva and Basel follow closely behind, and honestly, Switzerland just fully dominates the Top-6-Liste. Housing, food—everything is astronomically expensive there.

But what surprises me is this: several US cities still make it into the Top 25—San Francisco, Seattle, Boston. The cost of living in these tech hubs is truly impressively high. Honolulu, with 94.4 points, shows that even island cities have extreme costs. In Asia, I mainly see Singapore, Tel Aviv, and Hong Kong as more expensive metropolises, but they’re more in the middle range among the world’s priciest cities.

What’s interesting about the Index is that it compares everything to NYC as the baseline (100 points). Anything above 100 is more expensive, anything below is cheaper. When I look at the data, it becomes clear that Switzerland really plays in its own league—not just one expensive city, but several. Norway and California follow, but the gap to the world’s most expensive city remains significant.