Once Again, Mexico’s San Miguel de Allende Tops Travel + Leisure’s World’s Best List

As travelers seek to immerse themselves in local food and culture, travel agents can look to Travel + Leisure’s World’s Top 15 Cities list for the next-trending destinations and to get ideas about where to send their clients.

For the second year in a row, Mexico’s San Miguel de Allende, a designated UNESCO World Heritage site, came in first place. “With its colorful, flower-festooned architecture and cobblestoned streets, San Miguel has the feel of a village, but its large population of artists lends it a cosmopolitan air,” one Travel + Leisure editor said. Its appearance atop the publication’s 2017 list was a first in the award’s 23-year history.

Mexican cities nabbed both first and second place, with Oaxaca coming in the number two spot. Mexico City also made its return to the top 15.

Several cities in India and Southeast Asia made the list, including the lakeside Indian city of Udaipur and Chiang Mai, a laid-back city of temples and tuk-tuks in the mountains of Thailand. “Chiang Mai is a great city to visit if you’re looking for a more relaxed feel, but it’s still big enough to have plenty of shopping and restaurants,” said a Travel + Leisure reader.

Ranking sixth, Ubud, Indonesia, is also home to the publication’s Top Hotel in the World, the Four Seasons Resort Bali at Sayan.

Perennial favorites on the list included: Florence; Rome; Kyoto, Japan; and Charleston, South Carolina — the only city in the U.S. to make the top 15.

According to Travel + Leisure, here are the world’s top 15 cities:

1. San Miguel de Allende, Mexico
2. Oaxaca, Mexico
3. Udaipur, India
4. Ubud, Indonesia
5. Kyoto, Japan
6. Florence, Italy
7. Luang Prabang, Laos
8. Hoi An, Vietnam
9. Chiang Mai, Thailand
10. Charleston, South Carolina
11. Mexico City, Mexico
12. Cape Town, South Africa
13. Rome, Italy
14. Istanbul, Turkey
15. Beirut, Lebanon