The World’s 25 Most Beautiful Cities, According to Science

If there is anything in this world that truly defies quantification, it is beauty. But that hasn’t stopped people from trying to measure it.

These days, one of the most common ways to do this is to compare a set of height and width measurements of a visual image to determine how close its dimensions are to those of the visual image. Golden ratio: approximately one to 1.618. It is often claimed that humans are particularly partial to things –dog, CatsAnd plants and people – which closely reflect this ratio.

Taking measurements of a single flower or a single face to see how “pretty” it is seems easy. An attempt to give aesthetic value to The whole city A little more complicated. So analysts in Online Mortgage Advisor They focused their studies on architecture. They first mined Google Street View footage in cities around the world to obtain images of hundreds of residential streets and about 2,400 distinct buildings. Then they calculated the proportions of all those edifices to find out the extent to which each of them adhered to a golden ratio. “The higher the score, the closer the city buildings come on average to matching the golden ratio,” the researchers wrote.

If you prioritize athletic proficiency above all else when planning a sightseeing trip, your best bet is Italy: Venice ranked first with 83.3 percent, Rome came in second with 82. Florence landed in 13th place. France also boasted three cities in the top 25: Bordeaux, Paris and Strasbourg. Staying close to home is also a viable option, with four US cities making the list, from New York City in fifth place to Miami in 22nd place.

See the full list below, and discover other takeaways from the study here.

1. Venice, Italy // 83.3 percent
2. Rome, Italy // 82 percent
3. Barcelona, ​​Spain // 81.9 percent
4. Prague, Czech Republic // 78.7 percent
5. New York City, USA // 77.7 percent
6. Athens, Greece // 77.5 percent
7. Budapest, Hungary // 75.9 percent
8. Vienna, Austria // 75.8 percent
9. Bordeaux, France // 75.3 percent
10. Milan, Italy // 75.1 percent
11. Stockholm, Sweden // 74.8 percent
12. Paris, France // 74.7 percent
13. Florence, Italy // 73.6 percent
13. Tel Aviv, Israel // 73.6 percent
14. Copenhagen, Denmark // 73.2 percent
15. Marrakesh, Morocco // 72.7 percent
16. Chicago, USA // 71.7 percent
16. Amsterdam, Netherlands // 71.7 percent
17. Berlin, Germany // 71.3 percent
18. Istanbul, Türkiye // 70.2 percent
19. Saint Petersburg, Russia // 69.2 percent
20. Strasbourg, France // 69.1 percent
21. Dubai, United Arab Emirates // 67.6 percent
22. Miami, USA // 63 percent
23. Beijing, China // 55.6 percent