Wow 2 cities..what a sad showing
21. Beijing, China
92. Shanghai, China
84. Sao Paulo, Brazil
85. Rio de Janeiro, Brazil
Then look here..wow!
92. Shanghai, China
To be fair, Beijing and Shanghai definitely deserves better than some cities on the list. Do you really believe Shanghai is less attractive than Sao Paulo?
You have to look at the methodology.
Beijing and Shanghai did extremely poorly at 'People' and 'Promotion'.
https://www.bestcities.org/rankings/worlds-best-cities/beijing/
https://www.bestcities.org/rankings/worlds-best-cities/shanghai/
Let's look at their definition:
https://www.bestcities.org/methodology/
People
The immigration rate and diversity of a city, including the sub-categories of Education and Foreign-born Residents.
Beijing and Shanghai are actually extremely diverse. They have the concentration of many talents across China with more than a billion people from different geographies, climate, and income. They have different sub-cultures, dialects, accents, customs, values, mindset, behavior etc. But to foreigners, Han Chinese are lumped together as one huge ethnic group with little diversity.
Almost half of Shanghai/Beijing's population are migrants from other areas of China, but they score low on 'immigration rate' because they aren't 'foreign'.
Promotion
The quantity of stories, references and recommendations shared online about a city, including the sub-categories of Google search results, Google Trends, Facebook Check-ins, and TripAdvisor reviews.
Surprise! Google and Facebook are banned in China!
They use their own social media Apps and from what I've seen, they are much more dynamic than Facebook/Google. And of course, they can do a great job at promoting a place. There are so many travel videos on Douyin/Tik-Tok with
over a million LIKES. You can ask other Chinese members here.
@long_ @beijingwalker @hiseen
Take a quick look at this breathtaking compilation:
In fact, several travel hotspots which got so popular overnight had their environment strained because of the sudden jump in human traffic.
https://news.sina.com.cn/o/2018-11-05/doc-ihmutuea7216126.shtml
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So in conclusion, it's just another city ranking with different methodologies. And with it, it comes along with its own flaws. It doesn't mean Sao Paulo is necessarily better than Shanghai, or that China has few attractive cities. Tweak the methodology a bit and the ranking can change greatly.
