Time Out’s 20 Best Cities to Eat In

Lima, Bangkok, and Mexico City are the cities with the best food, according to the British magazine Time Out, which each year asks its readers about their favorite places to enjoy local specialties, drink, and book a table at a restaurant. In 2025 , New Orleans was crowned the queen of city dining. Let's see what this year's results are.

Time Out Magazine's Top Picks

The prestigious British magazine essentially maps taste: to achieve this goal, Time Out interviews residents of various cities, asking them to rate the food scene based on 18 selected criteria, including quality, value for money, and variety. It also involves chefs, journalists, food critics, and industry experts. Each ranking almost always presents a wide variety, with culinary traditions that are diverse and even distant, not just geographically.

This year, Lima, the capital of Peru, reigned supreme: the affordability of restaurants and supermarkets played a key role . In fact, 90% of people said eating out was actually cheap. Here, you'll find a diverse food scene: stuffed rocoto, a type of spicy chili pepper, mint-flavored ocopa cream, corn stews, and even Amazonian cuisine, which is gaining popularity in the South American food scene. However, if you had to eat just one thing, the magazine suggests, it would be ceviche, an appetizer that has been recognized as an Intangible Cultural Heritage of Humanity by UNESCO.

In second place is Bangkok. The Thai capital is a melting pot of cultures and influences, which also spill over into its culinary tradition: among the most well-known specialties are the iconic pad thai and the local street food that has made it the capital of taste in Asia. Finally, third place goes to Mexico City: here it's impossible not to immediately think of tacos, rich in quality ingredients such as corn, chili peppers, and avocado. The favorite among tourists and locals is the taco al pastor, a soft corn tortilla filled with marinated pork, orange, and chili pepper.

Naples, The Only Italian City in The Ranking

Throughout its history, Naples has been a flower that attracted bees from all over Europe: Greek, Roman, Spanish, and French dominations have left a significant social and gastronomic heritage and increasingly enriched the city's culinary offerings. Today, the Campania capital is characterized by a simple cuisine and a lively street food scene, which dominates the city's most ramshackle alleys. According to Time Out magazine, the dish to try is fried pizza, born in post-war Naples and an ambassador of simple cuisine: this specialty, in fact, is nothing more than fried dough filled with ricotta, tomato sauce, and salami. "A delicious, chaotic, and unmistakably Neapolitan dish," adds the English magazine in its description.

Naples is the only Italian city in this ranking, as it was in 2025. Unlike last year, however, it has gained a few places: in 2026, the city of Partenope reached fourteenth place, climbing several places compared to the previous ranking. This is a good result for the Campania capital, given that it even ranked higher than cities with highly regarded gastronomic traditions such as New York City, Medellín, and Marseille. Despite this, this year's ranking also highlights how Italy , the birthplace of the Mediterranean diet, is struggling to gain a foothold.

The Complete Ranking

The overall ranking is very diverse. There is a strong presence of European cities and even a large portion of the Americas, with Asian cities occupying more than a quarter of the ranking: Bangkok, Ho Chi Minh City, Beijing, Osaka, Hong Kong, and Bengaluru, the latter located in southern India. Compared to last year, Oceania is also represented, with Melbourne acting as the continent's ambassador. A curious case, however, is the case of the Colombian city of Medellín, which in 2025 had achieved third place on the podium but slipped to last in 2026.

1. Lima, Peru
2. Bangkok, Thailand
3. Mexico City, Mexico
4. London, England
5. Barcelona, ​​Spain
6. Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam
7. Melbourne, Australia
8. Beijing, China
9. Athens, Greece
10. Lisbon, Portugal
11. Cape Town, South Africa
12. Osaka, Japan
13. Bengaluru, India
14. Naples, Italy
15. New York City, New York
16. Hong Kong
17. Buenos Aires, Argentina
18. Marseille, France
19. Copenhagen, Denmark
20. Medellin, Colombia