A corner of HCM City at night. — VNA/VNS Photo

HCM CITY  —  HCM City, Việt Nam's commerce hub, has been ranked sixth among the top ten cities for expats to live and work abroad in 2021, according to a survey of more than 12,000 respondents from InterNations, an online expat community with more than 4 million global members.

The results are from InterNations’ Expat City Ranking 2021, which is based on the annual Expat Insider survey, and is one of the most extensive surveys on living and working abroad. This year, 12,420 expats participated.

The survey, conducted in January, asked expats to rate their satisfaction across four main categories, including quality of urban living, getting settled, urban work life, finance and housing, and local cost of living.

Based on these categories, the Expat City Ranking reveals the best and worst cities for expats to live in.

Among the top 10 destinations in the Expat City Ranking 2021, cities in the Asia-Pacific region are very well represented. The Malaysian capital city, Kuala Lumpur, leads the list of 57 cities around the world. Sydney (fourth), Singapore (fifth), and HCM City (sixth) are also on the list.

Málaga, a port city in southern Spain, and Dubai, capital of the United Arab Emirates, rank second and third respectively.

The remaining cities are Prague (Czech Republic), Mexico City, Basel (Switzerland) and Madrid (Spain).

Map of the best and worst cities for expats in 2021. Photo courtesy of InterNations

HCM City got the thumbs up from the expat community for the Urban Work Life Index. Up to 89 per cent were happy with life in general and 84 per cent were satisfied with the affordable cost of living.

Foreign residents in HCM City said it was easy to make friends (77 per cent) and appreciated the work-life balance (79 per cent). Many expats said they were happy with the quality of medical care.

European cities dominate in the bottom ten, with six out of the ten worst-rated destinations located across the continent. Apart from Rome (57th) and Milan (56th), there was Istanbul (54th) and Moscow (49th) in Eastern Europe, as well as Maastricht (50th) and Paris (51st) in the west.

Despite the Asia-Pacific region being very well represented among the top ten, one of its cities ends up at the bottom, with Tokyo ranking 53rd, according to the report. — VNS