I'll give Vancouver to the world, but I'll keep Victoria (Canada) for myself.

Vancouver also scored well in the following categories:

- 100 out of 100 in: "Does it ever stop raining here?".

- 99 out of 100 in: "If I don't get out of this rain, I swear to God I'm gonna lose it".

- 98 out of 100 in: "So, when does summer arrive around here anyway?"

And -

- 97 out of 100 in: "Forget this crap, I'm movin' to Arizona".

As a former Sydney-sider I'd have to question Melbourne even making the top ten much rather beating out Sydney!
To quote Billy Connelly:
"Its a nice enough place, needs a population transplant though"

As long as you speak francais, Montreal is much nicer to live in than the duller cities of West Canada.

Also, even though Canada and Australia have lower population densities, most of Canada's landmass is frozen wasteland and most of Australia's landmass is scorching desert. Both of them only have a small percentage of land that is liveable (the southern strip of Canada and the coasts of Australia), so that statistic is misleading.

my ignorance shows when i have never heard of Calgary before

I agree Vancouver is the place to live. I have been all over the world & it is the only place I would live. at least May to October. The rest of the year I live in Mexico since rain does not thrill me.

What kind of livability ranking puts Calgary ahead of Montreal?

To people wondering why Calgary is ahead Montreal, one word: healthcare.

Is weather one of the metrics? If not, I wonder whether Australian cities might not nudge ever further up the chart. People pay extraordinary amounts of money to seek out the kind of weather we experience here in Sydney most of the year.

Ockhams Beard...

You know I debunked that one years ago...
I left Australia 20 years back and people always say
"How could you leave? Don't you miss the weather?"

Its one thing to take a 10 day vacation on the beach in the tropics and enjoy the weather.
Its another thing to spend 6 months backpacking round Australia in the sunshine.

But its entirely another thing altogether to sit in 40C heat in a traffic jam on the Sydney Harbour Bridge day in day out. To be wearing a suit and not shorts. To swelter all day in stinking humidity waiting for a Southerly Buster to bring some relief and it brings golfball sized hail which destroys your car...Yeah vacationing in it and living in it are 2 different things.

8 out of 10 cities are predominantly English-speaking.

I'm not sure why Boston is not in top 10 list. I have doubts that it is worse off than either Toronto or Calgary on either of the metrics.

I mean, I can see why NY, Chicago or LA are not in top 10 of the list, but Boston?

I will also have to add the following cities to the question: "Aren't they better than top 10 cities?":

Zurich
Frankfurt
Boston
Kyoto

The Canadian and Australian cities in question actually have very high population density.

It is difficult to understand how the low population density of Canada as a whole can account for the liveability of Toronto and Vancouver, given that they are the two densest cities in the country, and much denser than comparable US cities (who ranked much lower). The regions surrounding Toronto and Vancouver are also very densely populated. Indeed, virtually every Canadian lives in a much higher-density setting then the one cited. The low overall population density in Canada is attributable to large areas without any permanent settlements, which function as hunting, fishing and logging grounds for adjacent first nations.

Regarding infrastructure problems and crime, the high-density areas of Toronto are in fact much more efficiently serviced and crime-free than surrounding low-density areas.

Re: The Ban"s Comment.

Reading your comments, I have to wonder whether or not you've ever been to either Canada or Australia. Both countries have much larger habitable areas than you seem to know about. And those areas that aren't all that comfortable year round? Why, they're just loaded with goodies like gold, diamonds, silver, zinc, oil, etc., etc., so I'd say both countries are pretty happy with their respective lot. The best cities in the world in which to live with back yards full of treasure.

Judging from this list, "liveability", in the eyes of the compilers, means "mostly white folks".

Calgary might have more sun than Vancouver, but unfortunately you're surrounded by all those conservatives who gave us the Reform Party, Steven Harper, and the like. Yikes! For all its faults, give me the warmth, variety and liveliness of Montreal any day! (Poor Toronto - with their unfortunate recent choice of mayor, that's one Canadian city sure to slide in this ranking.)

Calgary might have more sun than Vancouver, but unfortunately you're surrounded by all those conservatives who gave us the Reform Party, Steven Harper, and the like. Yikes! For all its faults, give me the warmth, variety and liveliness of Montreal any day! (Poor Toronto - with their unfortunate recent choice of mayor, that's one Canadian city sure to slide in this ranking.)

These cities may be liveable, but unfortunately they are also the dullest places on earth - give me New York or London any time.

The significance of these rankings is questionable. I am from Perth and live in Christchurch, New Zealand. The latter city is probably unliveable because it has a mere 350,000 people and does not appear on the rankings. Presently I am visiting Victoria, British Columbia, which my friends here consider superior to Vancouver for all sorts of reasons, but Victoria does not rate because it has only 250,000 souls and thus is also unliveable.

Meanwhile, the relative rankings of Perth, Sydney, Melbourne and Adelaide probably depend more on a person's state of mind than any real and measurable difference. But I can tell the reader that none of the other top ten cities has the clear blue skies, extensive green parks, magnificent ocean beaches and relaxed lifestyle of Perth. Whoops! Maybe this should be kept a secret.