Commenting Numbeo Cost of Living ranking for 2025
Choosing a good location to be based in is one of the most impactful choices you can make
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Just in: Numbeo CoL 2025
Zurich is the most expensive city in the world.
For devs spending 50% of their waking hours at home and the other 50% at the office, IMO Zurich is cheaper than SF/NYC/LA/Seattle.
Because rent is cheaper in Zurich. But pretty much everything else is more expensive in Zh.
Salaries in Zurich are high, but there's WAY MORE supply of high-paying tech jobs ($200-700k) in the above-mentioned US tech hubs. ~90% of devs in Zurich are making $100-150k.
Singapore and London can be bad deals.
Salaries aren't as high as in other high-paying locations, whereas CoL is basically on par with the most expensive cities in the world.
Singapore being better than London because at least taxes are lower and the place is well-run, safe, developed, etc.
With that said, if you're a "top player", you can earn pretty well in London too, and have a great QoL.
Paris and Amsterdam are respectively 35 and 36 in the global rank
Close to places like Atlanta (GA) or Denver (CO). They're OK places to live in. TC/CoL still better elsewhere though, without sacrificing much of the QoL.
Munich at 45
A bit cheaper than Paris/Amsterdam, with comparable (actually, slightly higher) salaries in tech. Could be interesting.
Dublin at 51st is in my opinion in the top 3 places in Europe for devs right now.
Lots of high-paying tech jobs. From last week's EuroTopTechJobs.com analytics: Dublin was 2nd in the rank of locations with the most jobs, with 362 jobs, after London (397 jobs) and before Warsaw (191 jobs).
Dubai at 115th spot is an interesting place today IMO.
Considering no income tax, upwards trajectory and so on. It has several downsides of course, but it's an interesting spot.
Barcelona and Madrid
At 146 and 147 have growing tech scenes. Especially Madrid which got 178 jobs in last week's Euro Top Tech Jobs analytics (4th hub in Europe).
Prague, Lisbon, Riga and Warsaw at 160, 161, 163 and 167
They’re interesting and good-value spots. They can also have contained taxes. Prague and Warsaw by default, Lisbon if one manages to get into the new NHR. Riga I don't know (but it's a top spot in Europe for real estate investment).
Among these, Warsaw has a very high supply of top tech jobs (3rd in Europe), and Prague has some good tech jobs too. Lisbon is decent. Riga I think it's mostly a remote-worker play.
Krakow at 181 is a great spot.
9th in Europe for top tech jobs (113), before Amsterdam (102 jobs).
Here’s some other considerations about other cities in the rank
Aarhus, Denmark is 42 and can be an interesting place IMO.
Google, Uber, Databricks currently hiring engineers in the danish city. Salaries ain't low, so are taxes. But public services are very high quality.
Milan and Brussels at 68 and 69
They are some of the worst places to be as a dev in Europe.
Stockholm at 72
Isn't in a good spot right now, as QoL seems to be in decline and salaries stagnating. WLB capital though.
Austin at 72 is in a great spot!
Considering the low(er) taxes, abundance of high-paying tech jobs, and contained CoL. Second city in the world for saving rates among big tech devs also.
Berlin at 95 seems weird to me.
Maybe someone living in Germany can confirm? That's about 14% cheaper than Munich. Could be though. Still not cheap anyway.
Limassol at 135th can be interesting for remote devs
As you can stay under 15% total tax, be at the beach in a beautiful island etc. Same as Dubai: not perfect, but interesting.
Tokyo and Rome at 143 and 144
Are very interesting cities to spend time in nowadays. Not sure about being officially based there because of taxes, but definitely cool and good-value spots in 2025.
Tirana, Seville, Malaga, Valencia at 172, 174, 176 and 179
Interesting good-value place to spend time in, not sure about being officially based there (taxes for Spain, public services for Albania).
Istanbul, Belgrade, Sofia, Budapest, Bucharest following in the 188-199 range.
All interesting places.
Bangkok at 207 (as a reference).
Varna, Podgorica, Antalya, Timisoara, Manila, Kuala Lumpur, Tbilisi, Skopje, Batumi in the 213-260 range.
Kiev, Rio de Janeiro, Medellin, Hanoi, Minsk, Saint Petersburg, Mumbai, Bangalore in the 266-297 range.
Which city would you choose to be based as a dev (either onsite or fully-remote)?
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Thanks for this post. I believe Brussels data doesnt highlight extraordinary benefits developers get there, like a fancy company car with paid fuel which can be traded for a full NET per month to pay for rent or mortgage.
Data speaks, but from todays post and after residing in Brussels for past 8 years (moved 6 months back) I feel blindly trusting such posts should be definitely avoided.
Don't get me wrong, I really appreciate your posts and the work you do.
Thank you!
> Interesting good-value place to spend time in, not sure about being officially based there (taxes for Spain
For people on high salaries moving to Spain, the tax situation is pretty good for the first 6 years if they qualify for Beckham Law
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Beckham_law
I transferred with my company from London to Madrid. I took a 20-25% pay cut (which was a great deal btw), but ended up earning about the same after taxes. And even if my net earnings had decreased by 20% I would have a better QoL in Madrid vs. London.