Singapore was recently recognised for being one of the smartest cities in Asia, with our local universities also ranking as some of the best in the region. This great foundation that we have clearly also benefits us in terms of our workforce, with the island city ranking number one on this year’s Global Talent Competitiveness Index (GTCI) by Insead and Portulans Institute.
This comes despite a less-than-ideal economic landscape, where retrenchment is increasingly common and both fresh graduates and established career people are having trouble in their jobseeking journeys.
2025’s results of the GTCI are a big win for Singapore. Moving up from second place in the last edition of the index, it’s the first time that our nation emerges at first place on the list since its inception in 2013, and we’re the only country in Asia as part of the top 20 – outranking plenty of Nordic countries including Switzerland, Denmark, Finland, and Sweden, along with USA and Australia. Going down the list, the next Asian country that appears is Japan (#28) followed by Korea (#31).
The pillars used to score each of the 135 countries in the list are: the ability to enable, attract, grow, and retain talent, along with their vocational and technical skills, as well as generalist adaptive skills. Singapore ranks especially high on the portion of talent retention, which the report states is due to us having “a strong regulatory environment and high standard of living” together with “enhanced outcomes in personal rights, physician density, and sustained excellence in personal safety”. Our formal education system is also mentioned in the report as one of the factors for our level of talent competitiveness.
Countries with the highest level of global talent competitiveness in 2025
- Singapore
- Switzerland
- Denmark
- Finland
- Sweden
- Netherlands
- Norway
- Luxembourg
- United States of America
- Australia
Find out more about the Global Talent Competitiveness Index here, and check out the full report with an in-depth explanation of the judging criteria here.