Authoritative survey ranks Spain world’s sixth-best for quality of life

People who have moved to Spain are treated to a high quality of life, the poll found.

A survey of expats in 64 countries by expat website InterNations has revealed that Spain ranks sixth overall in expats’ quality of life perception.

The 2015 Expat Insider survey harvested the opinions of 14,000 expats in what was one of the biggest polls ever on the subject of life lived in another country…

The results were largely unsurprising, save for the appearance once again of Ecuador high up the charts – the South American nation placing second for quality of life after Singapore, which topped the poll for the second time.

After Ecuador came Austria in third place, followed by Switzerland in fourth (Switzerland took top spot in 2014), Portugal in fifth and Spain in sixth place. The top ten was rounded out by Japan, the Czech Republic, Germany and South Korea.

The sub-categories of the survey ranked nations in terms of leisure options (where Australia scored highest), personal happiness (topped by Ecuador), travel and transport (Singapore won that particular poll) and health, safety and wellbeing (Austria came out on top), with the results collated into an overall score.

Spain’s performance in achieving sixth place was encouraging, and placed the country in the top four for Europe despite not topping any of the individual charts. In general, expats who move to Spain have above-average satisfaction where safety, happiness and wellbeing is concerned, whereas travel and transport tends to let the country down, at least in the eyes of the people who have moved there.

Personal happiness is a more arbitrary measurement, but the majority of Brits at least that move to Spain, regularly report that their social lives are richer after the move than before.

An interesting comparison to be had is that of the experience of expats who move to the UK. According to the InterNations poll, the UK performs badly on personal happiness and health, safety and wellbeing, placing the country 31^st overall despite a reasonably solid performance in terms of leisure options and travel and transport.