The two best cities in the world for technology career development are Bern and Zurich, while the top US city is Atlanta, according to a new report based on a variety of metrics. Credit: Roman Samborskyi / Shutterstock Bern and Zürich are the best cities in the world in which to pursue a tech career, based on data released this week by Scotland-based digital skills development organization CodeClan. CodeClan’s study begins with the top 100 cities in the world based on Mercer’s Quality of Living rankings, and uses a combination of several weighted indices to determine their suitability for technology workers, including average salary, rent and broadband connection speed, as well as tech companies per capita. Tech companies per capita a key metric The results show the two Swiss cities atop the rankings, based mostly on the large numbers of tech companies per capita in each place, coupled with high available broadband speeds. US cities fill out the rest of the top 10, though only two of the country’s more traditional tech hubs—Seattle and Boston—made that particular cut. San Franciso ranked 36th, due in large part to its extremely high cost of living, and New York 68th, for similar reasons as San Francisco. Meanwhile, the best US city in which to pursue a tech career, according to CodeClan, is Atlanta, which ranked third behind Zürich. A high concentration of tech companies, coupled with strong average broadband speeds, propelled it to third place, just ahead of Washington, D.C., in fourth. In respective order, Seattle, St. Louis, Pittsburgh, Miami, Minneapolis and Boston rounded out the rest of the top 10. Some patterns in the data are easy to see—Australian cities like Brisbane, Perth, Melbourne and Sydney were all heavily penalized for low average broadband speeds, while low salaries pushed Japanese cities like Osaka, Tokyo and Nagoya further down the list than their other scores might have indicated. Broken out by categories, the data also show that CodeClan’s analysis used national data, rather than local, to rank internet speeds, as all cities in a given country were given identical figures. The rest of the categories, though, provide useful comparative data on cities around the world. The highest average salaries, for example, were found in San Francisco, at $108,096, while the largest number of tech companies per capita saw a statistical tie between Zürich and Atlanta, at 0.016. Related content news analysis AI chip shortages continue, but there may be an end in sight While GPUs are in high demand, they still need high-performance memory chips for AI apps. The market is tight for both — for now. By Lucas Mearian May 07, 2024 7 mins CPUs and Processors Generative AI Technology Industry feature Windows 11 Insider Previews: What’s in the latest build? Get the latest info on new preview builds of Windows 11 as they roll out to Windows Insiders. Now updated for Build 22635.3570 for the Beta Channel and Build 26120.461 for the Dev channel, both released on May 3, 2024. By Preston Gralla May 07, 2024 252 mins Small and Medium Business Microsoft Windows 11 news analysis 3+ reasons Apple might want to make its own server chips Apple reportedly has a top secret plan to make AI chips for servers to provide generative AI services. By Jonny Evans May 07, 2024 5 mins Apple CPUs and Processors Generative AI opinion GenAI is to data visibility what absolute zero is to a hot summer day Given the plethora of privacy rules already in place in Europe, how are companies with shiny, new, not-understood genAI tools supposed to comply? (Hint: they can’t.) By Evan Schuman May 06, 2024 6 mins Data Privacy GDPR Generative AI Podcasts Videos Resources Events SUBSCRIBE TO OUR NEWSLETTER From our editors straight to your inbox Get started by entering your email address below. Please enter a valid email address Subscribe