Comparing The Cost of Living Around the World

The amount of money that’s needed to pay for day-to-day expenses like housing and food varies greatly from city to city. And some cities, like New York City, are known as especially expensive places to live.

So how do everyday expenses in New York City truly compare in costs to places like Beirut, Lebanon, or Bangalore, India?

This graphic by Victor Dépré (hypntic.data) uses 2022 data from Numbeo to compare the cost of living and purchasing power in 578 different cities around the world, using New York City as a benchmark for comparison.

The Cost of Living Index

Though New York City is widely recognized as one of the most expensive cities in the world, according to Numbeo—the world’s largest database of user-contributed data on cities and countries—there are a number of cities that are actually more expensive than the Big Apple.

Here’s a look at the comparative cost of living in 578 cities. For context, if a city has a cost of living index of 121, that means day-to-day expenses in it are 21% higher than New York’s, on average: