Barcelona · Cataluña
Barcelona
Spain's most stylish city — a thriving port and buzzing cultural capital where world-class art, football, design and Gaudí's Sagrada Família all compete for attention.
What Barcelona is like
Portrait drawn from The Rough Guide.
Catalunya's capital, a metropolitan area of nearly six million people.
On the table. Designer restaurants, tapas bars hidden down centuries-old alleys, and unmarked gourmet spots.
Worth the trip
- La Rambla, the Gothic Quarter and the Sagrada Família
- Montjuïc's MNAC and Fundació Joan Miró
- Park Güell and the Gràcia neighbourhood
- A day-trip to the mountain monastery of Montserrat, 40km northwest
Who it suits: Almost anyone — culture, food, football and design all in one city
The numbers
The decision data — each figure against the Spanish average. Regional overlays and estimates are labelled, and where there's no local reading we say so plainly.
Climate
- Winter average temp
- 10°C 2.2°C above the Spanish average (7.8°C)
- Summer high (Jul–Aug)
- 28.8°C 1.4°C below the Spanish average (30.2°C)
- Rainy days a year
- 56 days 18% less than the Spanish average (69 days)
- Sunshine estimated
- 7.3 h/day about the Spanish average (7.2 h/day)
- Summer water stress (WEI+) regional estimate
- 73 16 above the Spanish average (56)
Cost & economy
- Home price
- €4,682/m² 112% more than the Spanish average (€2,208/m²)
- Net income per person
- €19,527 35% more than the Spanish average (€14,495)
- Income growth ’18–’23
- 19.2%
Schools
- Schools in town
- 766
- Nearest international school
- 2 km
- PISA maths (region) regional estimate
- 469 12 below the Spanish average (481)
Healthcare
- Drive to a hospital
- 0 min
- Nearest health centre
- 0.9 km
- Surgical wait (region) regional estimate
- 142 days 32% more than the Spanish average (108 days)
Getting around
- Drive to nearest airport
- 23 min
- Fibre-to-home coverage
- 99% 20% above the Spanish average (79%)
- 100 Mbps+ coverage
- 100% 17% above the Spanish average (83%)
Who lives here
- Population
- 1,713,247
- Born in Spain
- 65.4% 23.4% below the Spanish average (88.8%)
- Born elsewhere in EU/UK
- 5.3% 1.5% above the Spanish average (3.8%)
- U.S.-born residents
- 5.39 per 1,000
Numbers: SettleSpain town dataset, derived from INE, AEMET, Mitma, Ministerio del Interior and the Catastro. National average = the unweighted mean across all 8,132 Spanish municipalities with data. A blank means no municipal-level figure is published — not a zero.
How does Barcelona fit you?
These are the town's numbers. Whether it's your town depends on what you're optimising for — winter sun or mild summers, a city or a village, short medical waits, an easy flight home. The 3-minute quiz scores Barcelona against every one of Spain's 8,132 municipalities on your priorities. It sits about 13 min from Hospitalet de Llobregat, L', if that's your anchor.
Take the quiz — rank Barcelona for you →Nearby towns
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