Tokyo, Japan is the world's safest megacity for 2026, scoring 94/100. We ranked every city above five million people on Kakapo's composite index — proof that scale and safety are not opposites.
Tokyo, Japan is the safest on this ranking for 2026, scoring 94/100 — against a set average of 74.0 across 49 cities.
Ranked by Kakapo's overall safety score, limited to megacities — those above five million residents. Big does not mean dangerous: several of the world's largest cities also rank among its safest.
| # | City | Safety score | Overall |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Tokyo, Japan | 94 | 94 |
| 2 | Taipei, Taiwan | 94 | 94 |
| 3 | Singapore, Singapore | 93 | 93 |
| 4 | Hong Kong, Hong Kong | 91 | 91 |
| 5 | Seoul, South Korea | 89 | 89 |
| 6 | Foshan, China | 89 | 89 |
| 7 | Nanjing, China | 86 | 86 |
| 8 | Sydney, Australia | 86 | 86 |
| 9 | Shenzhen, China | 85 | 85 |
| 10 | Shanghai, China | 84 | 84 |
| 11 | Suzhou, China | 84 | 84 |
| 12 | Beijing, China | 83 | 83 |
| 13 | Hangzhou, China | 83 | 83 |
| 14 | Harbin, China | 83 | 83 |
| 15 | Guangzhou, China | 82 | 82 |
For contrast, these are the lowest-scoring cities in the same pool on this metric — useful for calibrating what a given score actually means.
| # | City | Safety score | Overall |
|---|---|---|---|
| 45 | Lagos, Nigeria | 54 | 54 |
| 46 | Lima, Peru | 53 | 53 |
| 47 | Rio de Janeiro, Brazil | 52 | 52 |
| 48 | Johannesburg, South Africa | 41 | 41 |
| 49 | Baghdad, Iraq | 34 | 34 |
We queried the live Kakapo index for every city above 500,000 residents in scope, deduplicated by city (keeping the largest-population entity), and ranked them by safety score. The pool is every city over five million residents with a live Kakapo score. Scores draw on national travel advisories from seven governments plus crime, transport and healthcare data; full weighting is at https://kakapo.travel/about/methodology. Scores are comparative model estimates, updated continuously, not incident counts — this page reads them live, so the numbers match the rest of the site.
This analysis is free to cite in journalism, research, or content — all we ask is a link back. Copy the attribution below:
Kakapo Editorial Team (2026). Safest Megacities 2026. Kakapo. https://kakapo.travel/blog/safest-megacities-2026
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Kakapo publishes real safety scores for every destination, drawing on national travel advisories, local crime data, healthcare infrastructure, and night-safety measures. Kakapo Studies is our research imprint — independent editorial, no advertiser influence on scores. Contact: [email protected].