Seattle overtakes last year’s winner, Austin, Texas, to rank as the smartest city in the United States in 2024, with an overall score of 75.7 out of 100.

Home to the likes of Amazon and Microsoft, Seattle scores highly in our research for tech infrastructure, with 34 AI companies and 13 IoT companies per 100,000 people.

Regarding sustainability, it has also increased its tree coverage by 13,700 hectares between 2010 and 2020 and built the equivalent of ten electric vehicle recharging points per 100,000 people.

Of all the U.S. cities analyzed, Austin still comes out on top for smart city infrastructure, scoring 86.2 out of 100 in this category.

Culturally, Austin already celebrates the intersection of culture and technology with its annual SXSW event, which attracts more than 300,000 people each year.

The Texan city takes the top spot for infrastructure thanks to factors such as its high average broadband download speed of 275.60 Mbps, exceeding the U.S. average of 217.14 Mbps. Additionally, it is home to 337 AI companies, the equivalent of 35 per 100,000 people.

Kansas City is known for its green credentials, boasting over 12,000 acres of parkland. In 2022, local authorities announced plans to plant 10,000 more trees in the city within the next three years.

Our analysis shows Kansas City is also credited with expanding its tree coverage by 5,730 hectares over ten years. IQAir rates the air quality as ‘good,’ which is only achieved by 30 U.S. cities in our study. The number of EV charging points per 100,000 people is also one of the highest among American cities.

Washington, D.C., betters other well-known tech hubs in the U.S. for the size of its tech job market. With 50,203 tech jobs advertised at any one time, equivalent to an impressive 794.7 tech jobs available per 100,000 people.

Figures from StartupGnome show that Washington also excels in several metrics related to tech innovation, growth, and employment. More than 16,000 tech companies are located there, and the average software engineering salary is more than double the national average.

In second place is Atlanta, Georgia, whose flagship Georgia Tech produces the most technology graduates per year, and its growing reputation in the technology industry has seen companies such as Apple, Alphabet, Microsoft, and Visa open offices in the city.

The French capital, Paris, ranks the highest in Europe among cities best prepared for a smart city future, with an overall score of 76.4, overtaking last year’s winner, London.

Paris is boosted by several impressive metrics, including 99.9% 5G coverage* of the population by the average network provider, Europe’s second-highest number (532) of AI specialist companies, and the third-highest number (10,663) of free Wi-Fi hotspots.

Paris is also known for its smart traffic management systems, which help monitor noise levels, air quality, and other environmental factors.

*Nperf provided 5G coverage data by population for the United States and Europe.

The smartest European city also ranks highest in infrastructure and connectivity, scoring 91.8 out of 100 in this category.

Paris has many smart infrastructure features, including the third-highest number (145) of Internet of Things companies headquartered there and the fifth-highest average download speed for its fixed broadband at 173.06 Mbps.

The canal-lined city of Amsterdam scores the highest (75.4 out of 100) among Europe’s smart cities for sustainability factors.

Already known for its favored eco-friendly mode of transport, the bicycle, the city also aims to become the first European city to hit zero CO2 emissions by 2050.

It has more green-certified buildings (553) than any other city in our index and the most electric vehicle recharging stations relative to its population size (67 per 100,000 people).

Lisbon climbs to the top for tech jobs alongside Paris, the smartest city in Europe, scoring 89.1 out of 100 in this category.

While Paris has over twice as many tech jobs as Lisbon due to its sheer size, the Portuguese capital ranks much more favorably for tech jobs per 100,000 people, with 130 compared to Paris’s 62.

Many factors have contributed to Lisbon’s growth as a tech hub. Beyond favorable government and tax incentives, the city boasts some of the world’s highest numbers of developers and engineers per capita.

To assess the smartest cities in the United States and Europe, we analyzed 16 equally-weighted metrics across three categories: connectivity and infrastructure, sustainability, and the local tech job market. Our criteria align with the OECD’s guidelines for smart cities. Our study encompassed 68 cities, including the 48 largest cities by population in the United States and 23 capital cities across Europe, with comparable data.

Each metric was standardized and scored on a scale of 0 to 100 to ensure comparability across different data points. The analysis was conducted in April 2024.

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Jonathan Björkman
PR manager
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