Austria (and Vienna) Have High Quality of Life But Unfriendly Locals: Expat Insider Survey

Every year, the InterNations’ Expat Insider surveys thousands of expats all over the world, who score their new home countries across several categories. This year, Taiwan is expats’ favorite country, while Kuala Lumpur, in Malaysia, is the top city. And how did our fair alpine home do? Overall, Austria ranks 23^rd out of 59 countries, and Vienna 14^th out of 57 expat cities – in other words, the overall expat experience here is decidedly average. How did this come to be? While Austria and Vienna both scored high in the “Quality of Life” and “Working Abroad” indices, they tanked when it came to “ease of settling in” – as it turns out, most expats think Austrians are downright unfriendly.

Here, we put together some stats from this year’s Expat Insider 2021 survey.

Vienna: Great environment, grumpy people

Overall, Vienna is a pretty great city for expats to live in – but many find the locals grumpy. Perhaps the grumpiest…in the world?

Overall, Vienna is a pretty good place to life.

In fact, Vienna ranks #1 in overall quality of urban living – with top scores for health and environment, as well as for transportation.

But Vienna comes in dead last for local friendliness, and not much better for “getting settled” overall.

Fairly good scores when it comes to finance and housing.

When it comes to the urban work life index, Vienna ranks fairly high. For the full report, see https://www.internations.org/expat-insider/2021/the-best-worst-cities-for-expats-40189.

Austria: Nice place, but making friends is hard

Expats find Austria truly excellent when it comes to quality of life, especially travel and transportation. But settling in, they say, is hard – and find the Österreicher:innen pretty darn unfriendly.

Austria comes in 23rd place in an InterNations expat survey.

Expats find Austria decidedly medium when it comes to personal finance and cost of living.

While expats enjoy good a good work-life balance and stability, its harder to find career prospects.

This is where it gets ugly – expats struggle to feel at home or make friends in Austria.

But on the plus side, expats rank Austria as having the second-highest quality of life around the world. The full report is here: https://www.internations.org/expat-insider/2021/best-and-worst-places-for-expats-40108

Over at Metropole, we know that settling in can be hard. Chin up, expats – let it be sausage to you, as they say, if your neighbors are unfriendly. And remember, if you love Vienna, it just might love you back.

To read the full InterNations Expat Insider 2021 report about cities, go here. For countries, go here.