Vegan food discovery platform HappyCow has published its annual report outlining the world’s most vegan-friendly cities. Notably, while most cities on the list witnessed modest growth in fully vegan listings in 2024, Ho Chi Minh City in Vietnam saw a dramatic rise throughout the year.
Los Angeles, Portland, Berlin, and Amsterdam all saw a decline in the number of vegan listings, but the accessibility of vegan products and their strong vegan communities were enough to keep them on the list. Hamburg, Paris, and Bangkok, which appeared in the top ten for 2024, have been pushed further down the rankings this time around.
Top 10
London, UK, and Berlin, Germany top the list for the fourth consecutive year. These cities have 3600+ and 1700+ listings respectively in HappyCow’s database.
- London
- Berlin
- Los Angeles
- Portland
- Lisbon
- Barcelona
- Amsterdam
- Mexico City
- New York City
- Ho Chi Minh City
The Mexican capital, Mexico City, and Ho Chi Minh City make their first-ever appearances on the list, illustrating the increasing understanding and adoption of veganism in these regions. Along with Barcelona, Spain, and the Portuguese capital, Lisbon, these cities showed consistent growth across all metrics.
“Demand for vegan options and overall traffic continues to grow strongly”
The rankings are based on data from HappyCow’s global database, including the number of fully vegan, vegetarian, and veg-friendly businesses in each city. The density of vegan businesses and their growth since last year’s report have also been taken into account, along with qualitative factors such as ease of finding vegan options and how active the city’s vegan community is.
The publication of the report comes shortly after HappyCow celebrated its 25th anniversary. The platform was founded in 1999 and now lists over 244,584 businesses in 185+ countries.
“2023-2024 were challenging years for vegan businesses, with a significant drop in vegan restaurants in many cities,” said Eric Brent, founder of HappyCow. “This decline is partly due to increased vegan options at regular restaurants, leading to more competition. Combined with inflation, higher rents, and a reduced lunch crowd from remote work, these factors have created difficulties for vegan business owners who often operate on low margins and adhere to costly ethical standards. However, demand for vegan options and overall traffic continues to grow strongly.”
