The most expensive places to live on Earth

Even in the most expensive city in the world, petrol (37p a litre), cinema tickets (£7.99) and coffee (£2.48 a cup, including service) are cheaper than they are in London and much of the rest of the UK.

That's according to a new report that has ranked 214 of the world's biggest cities in order of how much it costs to live there.

But there is some good news for UK residents — if could be worse. Only one British city (London) made it into the top 100 most-expensive places to live and even then it fell from 17^th last year to 18^th this time around.

So where costs the most?

If you were going to up sticks and move abroad to save money, the worst place in the world you could pick is Luanda — Angola's capital city (pictured top left).

The African port has topped the list of the most expensive places for expats to live for the last two years, where you'd pay £12.64 for a fast food hamburger meal (£3.99 in the UK), £2.64 for a litre of semi-skimmed milk (76p in the UK) and £2.96 for a newspaper (£1.80 in the UK).

After Luanda, Tokyo — where a coffee costs £4.63 and a trip to the cinema sets you back £13.52 on average — N'Djamena in Chad, Moscow and Geneva are the most expensive places to live as an expat.

Global business consultant Mercer took a look at the cost of 200 items in each location across the world to come up with its ranking, including housing, transport, food, clothing, household goods and entertainment.

And the study revealed places as diverse as Sydney, Rio de Janeiro, Hong Kong and Oslo all cost more to live in than anywhere in the UK.

While people might be surprised to see two African cities in the top five, Mercer explained this was a problem of finding secure and high-quality places to live there.

"Accommodation prices are currently at record levels in cities like Luanda and this is generally the main reason why we find so many African cities high up in the ranking," said Nathalie Constantin-Métral, senior researcher at Mercer.

Where's cheapest?

If all you care about is saving money, Pakistan's largest city, Karachi, was found to be the cheapest place to live as an expat.

The seaport and financial centre cost just a third as much to live in than the most expensive cities.

After Karachi the cheapest cities were Managua in Nicaragua, Bolivia's capital La Paz, Ethiopia's capital Addis Ababa and Bishkek in Kyrgystan.

Not all good news

Sadly, with inflation running at 4.2% in the UK and prices for everything from food to domestic energy soaring, the UK is becoming more and more expensive to live in.

"Most UK cities have moved up the list," said Catherine Gervais, a global mobility expert at Mercer in London, pinpointing rental accommodation and increased prices on goods and services following the VAT increase as major culprits — as well as the fall in the value of the pound.

London's drop from 17^th to 18^th on the list was attributed to other cities seeing their cost of living rising faster, rather than London becoming less expensive.

The 10 most expensive and where UK cities ranked