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Revealed: the best countries for solo female travellers to visit

A new study ranks destinations for women to travel alone, based on aspects like safety and gender equality

Ed Cunningham
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Ed Cunningham
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Going solo is one of travel’s ultimate thrills, letting you get properly immersed in a destination. But travelling alone presents different challenges for different travellers. Things like gender, sexuality or ethnic background can – unfortunately – leave you with a much narrower shortlist of countries that are safe and/or accessible for lone exploring.

Now a travel company called Bounce has looked at several factors to find out which countries are the best for solo female travellers in 2022. Bounce’s study looked at serious stuff like levels of violence against women, rates of female homicide, laws on domestic violence, the extent of the gender pay gap and the percentage of women who say they feel safe walking home at night.

Bounce’s study isn’t just about gauging how safe a country is for women – it’s also about getting to grips with wider attitudes towards equality and independence. 

According to Bounce, the best country in the world for solo female travellers is Ireland, which the study says has strict laws against domestic violence and scores well when it comes to the gender pay gap.

Next in the ranking is Austria, which the study says has comparatively low levels of gender-based violence and a large percentage of women who say they feel safe walking home at night. Third is Norway, which apparently has the smallest gender pay gap in the list and a low female homicide rate. 

According to Bounce’s study, these are the top ten best countries in the world right now for solo female travellers.

  1. Ireland
  2. Austria
  3. Norway
  4. Slovenia
  5. Switzerland
  6. Spain
  7. Portugal
  8. Canada
  9. The Netherlands
  10. Poland

If you’d like to find out more, you can read Bounce’s full study for yourself here, and start planning some safe, happy and thrilling solo travels.

ICYMI: can you guess which is the world’s safest country right now?

Plus: these are the coolest streets in the world right now, according to us. 

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