Scandinavia has once again topped the Global Destination Sustainability Index, with Finnish capital Helsinki declared the world’s most sustainable tourist destination.
The ranking, from the Global Destination Sustainability Movement, evaluates cities across four areas – destination management, supplier, social progress, and environmental performance – with the top 40 cities included in the list.
In 2025, Scandinavia dominated the top 10, with more than half of the cities featured found in the region. After Helsinki, Sweden‘s Gothenburg came second, followed by Denmark‘s Copenhagen in third. The top ten was rounded out by Aalborg, Denmark; Glasgow, UK; Tampere, Finland; Aarhus, Denmark; Lyon, France; Belfast, UK; and Reykjavik, Iceland.
Helsinki took the top spot for a second year in a row, with the organisers behind the index noting that 99% of hotel rooms are sustainability certified, 54% of electricity comes from renewables, and the city is 80% of the way to reaching its 2030 carbon reduction target.
City of Helsinki tourism director Nina Vesterinen said, “For Helsinki, it is essential that sustainability is transparent. Sustainability must be more than just marketing-level greenwashing, which is already demanded by EU legislation requiring environmental claims to be reliable and verifiable. This is why indices and certifications such as GDS and GSTC are important to us.”
She added, “We are promoting tourism with all areas of sustainability in mind, reducing negative impacts and increasing positive ones. The aim is for Helsinki to be a better place when a visitor leaves than it was before they arrived.”
The news comes after the city announced that it aims to protect 10% of its land and sea area by 2038.
Europe also dominated the top 40, with three-quarters of those included in the list found on the continent. Outside of Europe, there were four destinations in Asia – Singapore (13th), Goyang, South Korea (15th), Songkhla, Thailand (28th), and Kumamoto, Japan (33rd) – as well as three in Canada, Montreal (20th), Quebec City (23rd) and Victoria (27th), plus three in Australia, Melbourne (11th), Brisbane (16th) and Sydney (25th).
