Survey ranks Victoria 2nd

Survey ranks Victoria 2nd-best city in Canada

Published 7:30 am Saturday, July 11, 2026

An aerial view of downtown Victoria. (Tony Trozzo/Victoria News)

Among the hundreds of towns and cities that pepper Canada’s forests, coastlines and prairies, Victoria has been named one of the best.

Travel + Leisure recently released its 2026 World’s Best Award, which annually ranks the best places to stay, eat and explore in Canada and beyond, as decided by its readers.

This year, Victoria was voted the second-best city in Canada, behind Quebec City.

Victoria received an 83.77 score, while Quebec City took home an 86.99 ranking.

Scores are calculated directly from the website’s annual World’s Best Awards survey, where respondents rate specific cities based on sights/landmarks, culture/arts, food, friendliness and overall value.

Ottawa (83.11), Montreal (82.78) and Vancouver (82.73) ranked behind Victoria in third, fourth and fifth spots, respectively.

Vancouver Island even ranked as the country’s best Island ahead of Cape Breton Island in Nova Scotia and Prince Edward Island.

As part of this year’s World’s Best Awards survey, more than 661,000 votes were cast on everything from safari outfitters to airlines.