Copenhagenize Index 2025: The Global Ranking of Bicycle-Friendly Cities
53 comments
·November 29, 2025makeitdouble
Paris being 5th when biking there is pure chaos compared to many Asian cities makes the ranking look capricious. Paris's City hall is definitely pro bike and a lot of money and effort was poured into infrastructure, but that dosn't suddenly makes it safe or largely adopted.
More generally, infrastructure isn't everything. Tokyo small streets with absolutely no markings can be way safer and bike friendlier than a bright lane in the middle of constant car traffic.
I'll note the company doing the ranking is based on Paris, so familiarity might hide many of the flaws.
fsh
I didn't even feel particularly safe as a pedestrian in Tokyo or Osaka. Despite the good public transport, Japanese cities have cars absolutely everywhere, even in tiny streets that should really be pedestrian zones. Paris is much better in my opinion.
rixed
Came here to say that. I've lived a long time in both Amsteram and Paris, and seeing those two cities close in that ranking call the whole thing into question. For sure, cities couldn't game the metrics used by tha ranking, but I'm sure the metrics definitions have been gamed to make some cities look better.
"Usage and Reach" is ranked better for Paris than Amsterdam? But in Amsterdam I can safely and efficiently bicycle from anywhere to anywhere, including across the rings, to the countryside and even to the sea, with the kids, and no fear. In Paris, I would not dare to venture outside of the touristic city center, and even there I would keep an eye on kids.
maelito
Ranking Bordeaux and Nantes next to Amsterdam is nonsense.
Amsterdam is miles ahead in terms of infrastructure. This ranking dilutes the most important thing to get these results : good bike lancés everywhere with no discontinuity.
Disclaimer : I've built villes.plus, an open source automated evaluation of bike lanes. 100 points, compute itineraries in "secure" mode with Brouter between these points, count the % of secured km -> score.
Amsterdam tops at 8/10. Bordeaux is at 3/10, Nantes 2/10.
prmoustache
I can't speak about Nantes which I haven't visited for decades but I think it is wrong to count bikes lanes as a single parameter.
Dutch urbanists have found that bike lanes are very important when streets used by cars are unaltered. Once you implement a lot of traffic calming features and cars never reach 30kph comfortably, bike lanes aren't that important and then streets can be shared across all users.
noobcoder
Fun fact Amsterdam recovers roughly 15000 cycles per year from their canal. IIRC they have a board with the number for each year
throwaway198846
What does it mean to be "secure"?
MeteorMarc
One reason for Utrecht scoring high: it has the largest bicycle parking lot of the world: https://bicycledutch.wordpress.com/2024/08/21/happy-annivers...
heresie-dabord
Bicycling is part of the mobility culture of Montreal, but whether Montreal is actually friendly to bicyclists is open to heated debate.
Cars dominate the topology.
werdnapk
I really enjoy biking in Quebec city. I don't have as much experience with Montreal, but I can see how QC is a top spot.
sandworm101
Montreal's city leaders might be friendly. Its climate is not. Once the snow falls, the number of bicycle commuters plummets towards zero. Paris, vancouver, the netherlands ... they have stable climates condusive to bike use. At -10 it isnt the cars that will cause a crash, it is the physica of a two-wheel object trying to navigate on ice.
betaby
> 'Bicycling is part of the mobility culture'
That's a very {Plateau,reddit,no-kids}-centric view.
spooky_deep
100%. Only a North American could consider Montreal bike friendly.
betaby
Montreal is bike friendly in comparison with Paris. Personal opinion of course.
spooky_deep
Why the Copenhagenize Index when Copenhagen is not particularly bike friendly by Dutch standards?
lifty
They hold themselves in high regard but Copenhagen doesn’t hold a candle to most Dutch cities. And for that matter, very few cities can compare themselves to the Dutch biking infrastructure, without even mentioning the cultural aspects and acceptance by other traffic participants.
usrnm
It's even more hilarious to see Paris in top 5
aallaall
Of course it helps if the city, and country in general, is completely flat. Cities in Norway or Nepal have mother nature against all form of manual locomotion.
analog31
Actually, I don't think it's a huge coincidence that a lot of cities are relatively flat, because they tended to develop near larger bodies of water.
Oslo is #18 on that list, not too shabby. Kathmandu is in a valley.
mnky9800n
I think Norway is more about being comfortable riding in the cold on spiked tires. The hills of Oslo don’t bother you after a couple months of riding them.
emilbratt
In Trondheim, Norway we have the famous bycicle lift. :)
mperham
Are you a time traveler from 2010 who's never heard of e-bikes?
noveltyaccount
In Copenhagen, the vast majority of people park their bikes on the street using only a cafe lock (frame mounted, immobilizes the rear wheel). The bikes are generally nothing special, old rusty junkers, with one or three gears. E-bikes flatten terrain but also you need an indoor place to store it and they become a magnet for theft. A cheap bike you can ride to the Metro and leave in the elements is versatile in a way e-bikes are not. (I say all this as a massive e-bike fan living in a very hilly US city who recently visited Copenhagen and adored its bike culture.)
aallaall
Do you think it’s a coincidence that the top two countries are completely flat?
UltraSane
E-bikes make this much less of an issue.
Toutouxc
For me personally charging and keeping e-bike batteries in the apartment is a source of stress. I do keep and charge my drone and FPV plane batteries at home, even DIY ones, but e-bike batteries are much bigger and harder to chuck out of the window in case something goes wrong. I actually got rid of my e-scooter because of that, I just didn’t trust it.
aallaall
No, E-bikes doesn’t make this much less of an issue.
mongol
The biggest hurdle to biking for me is parking safely. Unless I can park it behind locked doors I have an anxious feeling that it may not be still there when I return. This is no problem when bicycling to work, but for arbitrary errands it is. A good lock helps of course, but it still feels like a gamble.
teekert
In the Netherlands you just chain it to something then you’re fine. Otherwise it’s gone in 60 seconds.
jeroenhd
That strongly depends on the city and the places you park your bike. I've never needed to chain my bike, although I do it for new bikes because insurance demands it.
There are neighborhoods in cities like Amsterdam where bicycle theft is pretty much expected to happen no matter how many locks you buy, but in smaller towns there's barely a need to lock your bike at all during the day.
usrnm
Pro tip: just ride an old and rusty omafiets that nobody wants, no need for a chain.
petermcneeley
It is currently -1 to -3 in Montreal and -2 to -7 in Quebec (city). So yes folks literally freezing. It will remain so (down to -35) for the next 4 months.
werdnapk
People wear appropriate clothing for the weather. Those temperatures are no reason to stop biking. People do not "literally" freeze when it's below 0.
petermcneeley
It gets much colder than zero. With blinding northern winds. Yes a human can do anything but is it desirable?
TulliusCicero
Oulu Finland has plenty of biking in the winter, despite its extreme northern latitude. It's about infrastructure and investment.
petermcneeley
In Vancouver this mostly works because it is cold but not cold enough. There are only a few days where it is very sketchy. The rest of Canada is not like this.
Etheryte
Helsinki hits more or less the same weather, people cycle there just fine. It's only a matter of infrastructure and gear.
petermcneeley
Yes I agree but in general we dont have infrastructure and it gets much colder. Salt doesnt work at some point so you dont have dry pathways.
cgh
According to Wikipedia, the mean daily minimum of Helsinki in January is -5.6°. In Quebec City, it’s -17.7°. Not the same, at least according to Wikipedia.
breuleux
Eh, biking in the cold isn't really worse than walking in the cold. The snow is a bigger issue.
lifestyleguru
You better learn how to drive bicycle while sleeping because you are not renting or buying any housing in any of these cities.
bgnn
I'm not surprised to see Utrecht in the first place, but quite a bit surprised to see the other Dutch cities so low. No offense, but Rotterdam or The Heague is 100x better than Paris from safety and convenience point of view. I'm curious why is the ranking like this.
usrnm
I've lived in both cities and I'm surprised to see Utrecht above Amsterdam. Both are great, but I'd say Amsterdam is actually more bike-centered
piva00
How did you even manage to see the page? I just clicked on it and got to WPAdmin install page, asking to setup the admin account.
Completely agree with you, I've traveled with my bike to many cities in Europe, the Netherlands in general has a fantastic bike infrastructure, not even sure why it's called "Copenhagenize" since I go to Copenhagen quite often and compared to Dutch's bike infrastructure it's still not on par to it. It's definitely great but the Dutch have it ahead.
aleda145
I went to Copenhagen this summer. I was quite disappointed in the bicycle infrastructure, I felt like it was on par with what we have in Stockholm. Rented bikes and biked around for two days. It was nice!
Not sure how this index is being calculated (site breaks a lot), but my general feeling was that Denmark is just better at marketing than actual infrastructure when comparing to Stockholm at least
I always have a laugh when I see Copenhagen brag about its cycling infrastructure (e.g. Scandinavian Airlines declaring it bike-mecca in their flyers). I am very sorry, but it really doesn't come even close to Amsterdam, or most other Dutch cities really. There are a tonne of places where high-volume car traffic still intersects with low-speed bicycle traffic in Copenhagen, a lot of high-speed car roads with painted on lines, instead of actually separated infrastructure.
Also, the Netherlands is in its entirety covered in separated infrastructure optimized over decades. Just take a look at how anemic Denmark's infrastructure is outside the cities (https://www.opencyclemap.org/).