City Score
10 edEight pillars — tax, construction, broadband, radon, water, seismic hazard, population growth, and crime severity — averaged with equal weight into one national standing.
Open City Score table →
Rankings
Canadian city rankings 2025
Best cities in Canada by City Score — 343 places across eight open-data pillars. Open the leaderboard, face two hometowns in the compare arena, or browse cities by province and score.
City Score 2025 leaders
Top Canadian cities by composite standing — eight pillars averaged with equal weight.
| Rank | City | Province | City Score |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Barrie | Ontario | 77% |
| 2 | Fredericton | New Brunswick | 73% |
| 3 | Bradford West Gwillimbury | Ontario | 72% |
| 4 | St. Thomas | Ontario | 72% |
| 5 | Tillsonburg | Ontario | 71% |
| 6 | Innisfil | Ontario | 70% |
| 7 | Brockville | Ontario | 69% |
| 8 | Parksville | British Columbia | 69% |
| 9 | Dieppe | New Brunswick | 69% |
| 10 | Hamilton | Ontario | 69% |
| 11 | Whitchurch-Stouffville | Ontario | 68% |
| 12 | Arnprior | Ontario | 68% |
| 13 | Wasaga Beach | Ontario | 68% |
| 14 | Ponoka | Alberta | 67% |
| 15 | Pickering | Ontario | 67% |
Rank 1 can mean best or worst depending on the topic — check each list. Survey vintages that do not refresh every year are carried forward and labeled on city pages. Methodology · Data sources · Studies catalog
By topic
Same pillars that power City Score and the compare arena — pick a ranking to open the table.
Composite
Eight pillars, one standing
Water
Hardness and lead from municipal reports
Drinking water hardness
10 edMunicipal hardness in mg/L as CaCO₃. Slow-moving chemistry — older report vintages carry when no new reading lands.
Open hardness series →
Drinking water lead
10 edReported lead (µg/L) on municipal drinking-water panels. Rank 1 is the highest concentration in the edition.
Open lead series →
Construction
Permit value and momentum
Building permit value
10 edCalendar-year construction value under permit. StatCan totals where reported; documented estimates cover cities without a direct breakout.
View permit leaders →
Fastest-rising permit cities
Largest year-over-year jump in permit value. Requires a meaningful prior-year base so small towns do not dominate the board on noise alone.
View momentum ranking →
Tax
Residential mill rates
Connectivity
Broadband from federal coverage maps
Health & radon
Indoor air from Health Canada surveys
Safety
Crime Severity Index
Growth
Population change
Cited external lists
Publisher rankings cited with place, rank, year, and a link to the original — never blended into City Score.
Housing (cited)
Affordability and rental markets from open publisher tables
CMHC Average 2-Bedroom Rent — Lowest Rent
1 edAverage rent for purpose-built 2-bedroom apartments (all tenants) from CMHC Rental Market Survey. Rank 1 = lowest average rent among covered CMAs.
Open cited series →
CMHC Purpose-Built Rental Vacancy — Highest Vacancy
2 edPurpose-built rental apartment vacancy rate from CMHC Rental Market Survey (October). Rank 1 = highest vacancy (most available rental stock among covered CMAs).
Open cited series →
Demographia International Housing Affordability — Canadian Markets
3 edCanadian subset of Demographia median multiple (median house price / median household income). Rank 1 = most affordable (lowest median multiple) among Canadian major markets in the international survey.
Open cited series →
National Bank Housing Affordability — Highest Mortgage Stress
2 edRanked by Mortgage Payment as a Percentage of Income (MPPI) on a representative home. Rank 1 = highest MPPI (least affordable). Free quarterly Housing Affordability Monitor tables.
Open cited series →
RBC Housing Affordability — Least Affordable Markets
3 edRanked by RBC aggregate Housing Affordability Measure (% of median pre-tax household income for mortgage, property taxes, and utilities on a benchmark home). Rank 1 = highest ownership-cost burden (least affordable). CMA markets mapped to primary city slugs.
Open cited series →
Livability (cited)
Newspaper-safe citations of commercial community rankings
EIU Global Liveability Index
4 edRanks ~173 cities on stability, healthcare, culture & environment, education, and infrastructure. Full dataset is paid; OpenStats stores only ranks and scores published in free press releases and news coverage.
Open cited series →
Globe and Mail Most Livable Cities
1 ed2023 data partnership with Environics Analytics ranking 439 Canadian communities on ten livability categories.
Open cited series →
Maclean's Best Communities
2 edSuccessor-style municipal livability ranking published by Maclean's for 2019 and 2021 (no 2020 edition).
Open cited series →
MoneySense Best Places to Live
6 edAnnual composite ranking of Canadian municipalities on economy, housing, crime, health, and weather.
Open cited series →
Quality of life (cited)
Global city indexes with Canadian entries
Mercer Quality of Living City Ranking
2 edExpat-oriented quality of living ranking across 39 factors in 10 categories. OpenStats stores Canadian cities named in free Mercer press releases (typically top-25 highlights), not the full paid ranking.
Open cited series →
Numbeo Quality of Life Index by City
3 edCrowd-sourced composite Quality of Life Index. Historical snapshots are free on Numbeo ranking pages; OpenStats cites Canadian cities from those public pages (cite_only). Higher index scores are better; ranks are global position on the snapshot page.
Open cited series →
Topic atlases
Municipal readings behind each row — permits, tax, internet, radon, hazards, and drinking water.
Further reading
Local news for the same cities
These rankings draw on official statistics. For recent local stories about construction, housing, or hazards, these newspapers cover many of the same municipalities.
These links open third-party sites. They are independent of OpenStats and may show their own ads or paywalls.
National
- CBC News · National
- The Globe and Mail · National
- Canadian Press · Wire
Prairies
- Calgary Herald · Calgary
- Edmonton Journal · Edmonton
- Winnipeg Free Press · Winnipeg
- Saskatoon StarPhoenix · Saskatoon
Ontario & Quebec
- Toronto Star · Toronto
- Ottawa Citizen · Ottawa
- Montreal Gazette · Montreal
- La Presse · Montreal
British Columbia
- Vancouver Sun · Vancouver
- The Province · Metro Vancouver
- Victoria Times Colonist · Victoria
Atlantic
- Chronicle Herald · Halifax
- Telegram (St. John's) · NL