vpn.jpn.com started with 150 of the world's largest cities by population, using the UN's Degree of Urbanisation definition, then narrowed the list to 104 after excluding cities with insufficient data. Each city got scored out of 100 across six factors: coworking space density, entertainment venues, cultural venues, national internet speeds, local price levels, and what the study calls "comfortable working days," meaning days with an average temperature between 15°C and 28°C and less than 5mm of rain.

Seoul took the top spot with a score of 73.60. Tokyo followed at 72.61, then Hanoi, Taipei, and Osaka rounded out the top five. Barcelona and Madrid were the only European cities to make the top ten, and Madrid actually tied São Paulo's score of 66.67 but ranked seventh on an undisclosed tiebreak, according to Rio Times Online's coverage of the ranking.

Three numbers carried São Paulo into the top ten. The city logged 252 comfortable working days, the highest count in the entire top ten, thanks to its plateau elevation keeping temperatures milder than most of tropical Brazil. Local prices came in roughly 53% below the US price level the study measured against. And São Paulo has, by a wide margin, the deepest coworking and cultural infrastructure of any city in South America, which is the factor that separates it from Rio de Janeiro or Buenos Aires on this particular scorecard.

That coworking density isn't random. São Paulo is Brazil's financial and tech capital, home to more startup offices and tech company headquarters than anywhere else in South America. A city that already needs to house thousands of local software engineers and finance workers in flexible office space was always going to score well on coworking infrastructure. The study measured the symptom. The tech industry is the reason it exists in the first place, and it's a big part of why São Paulo feels genuinely built for remote work rather than just tolerant of it.

None of that is wrong. It's just a narrow slice of what actually matters when you're deciding where to spend the next three months with a laptop.

Rio Times Online's writeup was blunt about the gaps: the methodology never factors in commute time, safety, or visa access. Brazil has offered a renewable one-year digital nomad visa since 2022, a real advantage over plenty of cities that scored higher, and the study doesn't credit it at all. The source itself drew scrutiny too. Rio Times pointed out that vpn.jpn.com is a commercial VPN review site, not an academic or government research body, which doesn't make the data fake, but does mean nobody should treat this as a peer-reviewed study.

The independent newsletter Nomag went further, arguing the whole exercise measures "large, dense, entertaining cities where someone with a laptop could theoretically have a very nice Tuesday" rather than what nomads actually pick destinations for. Their point lands hardest on Tokyo, the study's number two city: Japan's own digital nomad visa caps out at six months with no extension, a dealbreaker for anyone trying to build a real life somewhere. The newsletter's closing line sums up the skepticism well: digital nomads are people, not an Excel formula. The bias toward megacities also means the ranking structurally can't reward the islands, small towns, and secondary cities that a lot of experienced nomads actually prefer.

None of this means São Paulo doesn't deserve a look. It means the ranking is a headline, not a decision-making tool.

Nomads.com, the platform formerly known as Nomad List, tracks real spending data from people currently living in the city. Their numbers put a typical nomad budget at $2,613 a month, an expat budget closer to $1,723, and a one-bedroom studio in the center around $669 a month. A hot desk at a coworking space runs about $168 a month. Day-to-day costs stay low: dinner out averages $9, a coffee $3, a beer $3.

Internet speed is the one number worth flagging before you commit to a base here. Nomads.com rates the city's average connection at 18 Mbps, which they classify as slow relative to other nomad hubs, though the power grid gets a "great" rating and outages are rare. If your work depends on heavy video calls or large file uploads, test the connection at your specific building before signing a lease, not after.

For money coming in from abroad, Wise handles USD to BRL conversions at the real exchange rate, which matters more in Brazil than in most countries given how much local banks mark up currency exchange for foreign cards.

The ranking treats São Paulo as one data point, but the city is 19 million people spread across neighborhoods with almost nothing in common. Our earlier guide to São Paulo covers this in more depth, but for nomads specifically, a handful of areas do most of the work.

Vila Madalena and Pinheiros are the creative core, packed with street art, galleries, and the kind of nightlife that keeps the entertainment-venue score high. Jardins is the upscale, quieter option, walkable and considered one of the safer parts of the city. Itaim Bibi sits nearby and pulls a similar crowd. Liberdade holds the largest Japanese community outside Japan, with Japanese-language signage and food that has nothing to do with the sushi-and-teriyaki version most Americans grew up on. Mooca leans Italian, Bras leans Middle Eastern by way of Syrian and Lebanese immigration, and both are worth a visit even if you don't base there.

A nomad who spent three weeks in the city and wrote about it for Travel Off Path named Osmose Coworking, BUCC, and Estacao Coworking in Vila Madalena as standout workspaces, and flagged something worth knowing before you go looking for a laptop-friendly café: São Paulo's café culture is thin compared to other nomad hubs. Brazilians default to padarias, self-service bakeries built for a quick coffee and pastry standing up, not a four-hour work session. Plan around coworking spaces rather than counting on café culture to carry you.

The metro is reliable and cheap, and Uber covers what the metro doesn't, though the same writer clocked typical Uber fares between $10 and $15, higher than the metro but still far below what the same trip costs in most cities that outranked São Paulo on this list.

None of the six factors in the vpn.jpn.com study touch food, which is one of the biggest gaps for anyone actually deciding whether to spend three months here. We've been back to São Paulo enough times now to say this without hedging: it has one of the best food scenes in Latin America. The city absorbed waves of Italian, Japanese, Lebanese, and Portuguese immigration and never flattened any of it into a single "Brazilian fusion" gimmick. You can eat Neapolitan-style pizza in Mooca, izakaya-style small plates in Liberdade, and Levantine flatbread in Bras, all in the same afternoon if you're willing to take a few Ubers between neighborhoods.

The city is also relentlessly artsy. Between the street art covering Vila Madalena, the gallery circuit around Avenida Paulista, and a live music scene that runs from samba and MPB to underground electronic nights, there's rarely a week without something worth closing the laptop for. If you're the kind of nomad who needs a reason to leave the apartment, São Paulo gives you one most nights, which matters more for long-term happiness than any coworking density score.

Having been to São Paulo often, we've noticed something the ranking has no way to measure: the digital nomad scene here is noticeably smaller than in Rio de Janeiro or Florianopolis. That sounds like a downside until you've actually lived it. Rio and Florianopolis both have large, established nomad communities, which makes it easy to spend months in either city speaking almost entirely English and socializing almost entirely with other foreigners. São Paulo doesn't hand you that option as easily. Fewer nomad-only meetups and fewer English-first coworking crowds mean more pressure, in a good way, to actually make Brazilian friends and step into the local community instead of orbiting around it.

This is the question the ranking skips entirely, and it's the one most people actually ask before booking a flight. Nomads.com rates the city's overall safety as "okay," with a similar rating for solo women, based on over 1,000 nomad reviews. That's not a glowing score, but it's not a warning either. Our own earlier reporting on the city found the same pattern: stick to well-traveled neighborhoods like Pinheiros, Vila Madalena, and Jardins, keep your phone out of sight on the street and on transit, and the risk profile looks a lot more manageable than the city's reputation suggests. The Travel Off Path writer echoed this almost exactly, noting that pickpocketing is a real issue but that three weeks of normal precautions produced zero incidents.

On our most recent trip, we noticed something the crowd-sourced ratings haven't caught up to yet: Centro is visibly getting cleaned up, with a heavier police presence in the areas where petty crime has historically clustered. We'd stop short of calling it a lasting trend. The same shift is happening right now in Rio's tourist areas, and both cities have elections coming up, which tends to produce a temporary crackdown rather than a permanent fix. Worth watching over the next year rather than something to bank on today.

Worth knowing if you're traveling as a couple or a throuple: Nomads.com flags reports of violence against LGBTQ+ people in the city despite giving it a strong overall LGBTQ+ rating, which is a real contradiction and not one to wave away. The practical read is the same as general safety advice: your experience will depend heavily on which neighborhood you're in and how much you're visibly signaling in public, which is frustrating advice to give but the honest one.

Before you book anything, three things are worth locking down. First, travel and nomad insurance through SafetyWing covers you for the length of a long stay in a way that standard travel insurance doesn't. Second, book your first month somewhere flexible through Booking.com rather than signing a long lease sight unseen, then move once you know which neighborhood actually fits how you work and live. Third, if you're planning to stay past the standard tourist window, Brazil's renewable one-year digital nomad visa is the legal path, and it's a genuine advantage this ranking never credits.

Yes, with a caveat. The methodology is real, and São Paulo's 252 comfortable working days and deep coworking infrastructure are genuine strengths that show up whether or not a Japanese VPN site decides to score them. But a ranking built entirely from measurable inputs will always miss the parts of a move that aren't measurable: whether the visa situation works for your specific job, whether you can find a coworking space with internet fast enough for your calls, whether the neighborhood you land in feels safe at 11pm. Use the ranking as a reason to look closer at São Paulo, not as a substitute for looking closer.

Tour Radar
Good for safe and professional organized group tours.

Booking.com
Helpful for private studios and long term deals.

Skyscanner
Simple for tracking flight prices in and out of Brazil.

HolaFly
Reliable eSIM for immediate mobile data in Brazil. Get 5% discount on all plans.

Brazil Travel Essentials
Everything you need for Brazil, and nothing you don't.

Kiwi
Great for multi city travel across South America.

What ranking did São Paulo get for digital nomads in 2026? São Paulo placed eighth out of 104 cities worldwide with a score of 66.67, the only Latin American city in the top ten, according to a study published by vpn.jpn.com in August 2026.

Who conducted the digital nomad city ranking that included São Paulo? vpn.jpn.com, an independent VPN review platform based in Japan, conducted the study. It is a commercial site rather than an academic or government research body, which is worth keeping in mind when weighing how much authority to give the ranking.

Is São Paulo safe for digital nomads? Crowd-sourced data from Nomads.com rates overall safety and safety for solo women as "okay," based on more than 1,000 reviews from people who have lived there. Sticking to neighborhoods like Pinheiros, Jardins, and Vila Madalena, and keeping valuables out of sight in public, brings the practical risk down significantly.

Does Brazil have a digital nomad visa? Yes. Brazil has offered a renewable one-year digital nomad visa since 2022, a real advantage over cities like Tokyo, where the visa caps out at six months with no extension. The 2026 ranking study didn't factor visa access into its scoring at all.

What does it cost to live in São Paulo as a digital nomad? Nomads.com puts a typical nomad budget around $2,613 a month, with a coworking hot desk running about $168 a month and a one-bedroom studio in the center around $669 a month. Day-to-day costs like coffee, beer, and casual dining stay in the $3 to $9 range.

Is São Paulo's internet fast enough for remote work? Average speeds sit around 18 Mbps citywide, which Nomads.com rates as slow compared to other nomad hubs, though the power grid is reliable. Test the connection at your specific building or coworking space before committing to a long stay.

Is São Paulo's digital nomad community as big as Rio de Janeiro's? No, and that's part of the appeal. The nomad scene in São Paulo is noticeably smaller than in Rio de Janeiro or Florianopolis, which means fewer English-first meetups and cafes built around foreigners, but a much easier path into the local Brazilian community if you're looking to actually integrate rather than stay inside an expat bubble.

Affiliate Disclaimer: Some of the links in this post are affiliate links, which means if you purchase through them, Cheers to Travels may earn a small commission, at no extra cost to you. We only recommend products we truly believe in.