Africa’s cleanest cities: Kigali still on top

The decline of South African cities, the rise of Nigerian cities and the breakthrough of Benin’s economic capital: the latest edition of our ranking on the continent’s metropolitan attractiveness offers plenty of insight into how cities are tackling the challenge of cleanliness.

Kigali in first place and Rabat in second – the top of the 2025 ranking of Africa’s cleanest cities is exactly the same as last year. Yet the survey method used to produce our ranking of the 30 most attractive African cities – from which the cleanest cities ranking is derived – has evolved slightly compared with the previous edition.

In addition to new cities being surveyed, including Tangier, Marrakech, Pretoria, Mombasa and Dar es Salaam, and a far larger number of respondents (1,918 in 2024 compared with 7,877 this year), the profile of the respondents has changed

Previously, the panel was mainly made up of readers of The Africa Report and our sister magazine, Jeune Afrique; this year, it is primarily composed of permanent residents of the cities surveyed, thanks to the participation of our partner Sagaci Research.

This change in profile has had noticeable effects, particularly for South African cities, whose residents are far more critical of their home base than our reader community. Cape Town has dropped four places, from 5th to 9th, and, more dramatically, Johannesburg has plummeted, falling from 7th to 29th.

A similar trend can be seen among residents of Accra (which drops from 10th to 24th), Alexandria (from 3rd to 12th), Lusaka (from 12th to 26th) and Lomé (from 16th to 25th).

Relatively few cities, by contrast, have moved up the ranking – mainly because six new metropolitan areas have entered the list, some placed very high, such as the Moroccan cities Tangier (4th) and Marrakech (5th).

Two notable exceptions, however, are both in Nigeria: Abuja rises eight places, from 14th to 6th, and Lagos six, moving from 27th to 21st.

Cotonou carves out a place

For all other cities, positions remain largely the same and reflect a reality: the cleanliness of a municipality is the result of multiple actions, often quite long to implement. That includes investments in sanitation, the establishment of dedicated and effective governance, public education programmes, or the enforcement of regulations.

That is a combination that Cotonou seems to have mastered – the economic capital of Benin, 6th last year, now ranks as the third cleanest city in Africa. See you next year.

Cover photo:  View of Kigali, number one in our cleanliness ranking © Rights reserved