Shenzhen was ranked the world's 42nd most expensive city for expatriates, in a Cost of Living Survey by Mercer, released Wednesday (June 30).
Shenzhen ranked 22nd in last year's survey by the financial services firm.
Hong Kong was ranked eighth most expensive city, followed by Beijing (16th), Shanghai (25th) and Guangzhou (38th).
For the first time, the ranking of the world's top 10 most expensive cities includes three Asian cities Tokyo (2nd), Osaka (6th) and Hong Kong and three African urban centers Luanda (1st) in Angola, Ndjamena (3rd) in Chad and Libreville (7th) in Gabon.
Luanda in Angola is the world's most expensive city for expats, with Ndjamena in Chad in third place. Moscow (4), Geneva (5) and Zurich (8) are the most expensive European cities, followed by Copenhagen (10).
Karachi is ranked as the world's least expensive city for expats. The survey found that Luanda is three times as costly as Karachi.
The survey covers 214 cities across five continents and measures the comparative cost of over 200 items in each location, including housing, transport, food, clothing, household goods and entertainment.
It is the world's most comprehensive cost of living survey of expats and is used to help multinational companies and governments determine compensation allowances for their expatriate employees.
New York is used as the base city against which all other cities are compared.
(By Mu Zi)
