Osaka Overtakes Kyoto to Claim #1 Spot as World’s Most Attractive Tourism City

Yanolja Research Announces ‘Global Tourism City Attractiveness Index’

SEOUL, South Korea, July 2, 2025 /PRNewswire/ — Yanolja Research, a global research institute specializing in the travel and tourism industry, today announced the inaugural “Yanolja Attractiveness Index” at the <2025 Global Tourism City Attractiveness Evaluation> seminar. This new index objectively assesses the appeal of major tourism cities worldwide from the perspective of the tourists themselves.

Developed jointly by Yanolja Research, Purdue University’s CHRIBA Institute in the U.S., and Kyung Hee University’s H&T Analytics Center in Seoul, Korea, the index evaluated the attractiveness of 191 tourism cities using global social media data in 14 languages, provided by Brandwatch in the UK. In the 2025 evaluation, Osaka, Japan, rose two ranks from its 3rd place in 2024 to secure the top spot overall, while Kyoto, which held the #1 position in 2024, shifted to 3rd place. Beyond Osaka and Kyoto, Japan demonstrated its status as a world-class tourism powerhouse with a total of six tourism cities ranking within the top 20, including Okinawa (10th), Fukuoka (11th), Tokyo (12th), and Sapporo (18th).

New Metric Evaluates Tourism Cities Through ‘Psychology’ and ‘Emotion’

Unlike traditional “tourism competitiveness” evaluations that focus on supply-side factors like transportation, accommodation, infrastructure, and policy, the “Yanolja Attractiveness Index” prioritizes measuring a tourism city’s “appeal” from the perspective of actual travel consumers. To achieve this, it uses two core pillars: “Tourism City Attractiveness,” which indicates how positively a specific tourism city is viewed, and “Tourism City Reputation,” which reflects how widely known and discussed it is.

Based on these two pillars, Yanolja Research conducted a comprehensive evaluation by segmenting a tourism city’s attractiveness into four key dimensions: ▲Beauty and Natural Scenery of the City ▲Culture and History of the City ▲Experiential Content of the City ▲Hospitality of the City.

2025 Global Tourism City Attractiveness: Japan’s Dominance and Asia’s Strong Performance

In the 2025 overall rankings, the dominant performance of Japanese tourism cities was evident. Osaka surged from 3rd place in 2024 to 1st, and Kyoto maintained its top-tier position at 3rd. Furthermore, Okinawa (11th→10th) and Sapporo (22nd→18th) saw their rankings climb, while Tokyo (12th) and Fukuoka (11th) consistently held top positions, proving the broad appeal of Japanese tourism. In the Asian continental rankings, Osaka and Kyoto secured 1st and 2nd place respectively, solidifying their status as the region’s premier tourism cities.

Globally, Asian tourism cities showed significant progress. Southeast Asian tourism cities like Bangkok (16th→7th), and Chiang Mai (61st→20th) saw their rankings soar, emerging as new popular tourism cities. Conversely, while European tourism cities such as Paris (2nd), London (6th), and Rome (8th) still exhibited strong brand power, some traditionally popular tourism cities like Madrid (17th→29th) and Barcelona (19th→25th) experienced drops in their rankings, indicating they are facing shifting tourism trends. In the Americas, U.S. tourism cities, led by New York (4th), continued to demonstrate strength.

Commenting on the research findings, Dr. SooCheong Jang, Professor at Purdue University and Head of Yanolja Research, stated, “The ‘Yanolja Attractiveness Index’ is the first attempt to analyze a tourism city’s ‘appeal’ factors through the actual voices of tourists, going beyond infrastructure-centric evaluations. The strong performance of Japanese tourism cities, including Osaka, and the significant progress of other Asian tourism cities demonstrate how dynamically tourist preferences are changing. Moving forward, for tourism cities to lead the global market, discovering and communicating their unique charm will be a core strategy.”

Yanolja Research plans to regularly announce the “Yanolja Attractiveness Index” annually to track global tourism trends and changes in tourism city competitiveness. Detailed results and analysis of the Global Tourism City Attractiveness Index, released on July 2, can be found on the official Yanolja Research website (https://www.yanolja-research.com).

[Appendix] Top 20 Cities in the 2025 Global Tourism City Attractiveness Index