WalkablyIs Barcelona walkable?
This page covers greater Barcelona: 2.7 million people, including l'Hospitalet de Llobregat and Badalona.
In Barcelona, the walk to health care is the strong point: 2 minutes for the typical building, much better than most of Europe. Its weakest point against Europe is the walk to a park, and even that is 2 minutes for the typical building, much better than most of Europe. Walking is easiest in el Poble-sec (score 88) and hardest in Vallvidrera, el Tibidabo i les Planes (score 51): a gap of 37 points.
The walk to eight daily needs
The typical walk is the middle value: half of the buildings in Barcelona have a shorter walk, and half have a longer one. The words compare it with every place where people live in the 20 countries on the map, so the same minutes get the same word everywhere.
| Need | Typical walk | Compared with Europe | Buildings with one within 20 min |
|---|---|---|---|
| Groceries | 2 min | Much better than most | 99% |
| Food and drink | 1 min | Much better than most | 100% |
| Shops | 1 min | Much better than most | 99% |
| Health | 2 min | Much better than most | 99% |
| School | 3 min | Much better than most | 99% |
| Parks | 2 min | Much better than most | 100% |
| Culture | 3 min | Much better than most | 98% |
| Public transport | 2 min | Much better than most | 100% |
Compared with the rest of the country
The map is cut into six-sided cells 55 m across, and every cell that a street passes through gets a score: we call these street cells. We sort all 16,714,737 street cells in Spain from hardest to easiest to walk, then cut the list into five equal groups, called fifths. In Barcelona, 90% of the street cells are in the most walkable fifth, more than the 20% of an average place.
| Fifth of the street cells in Spain | Bar | Barcelona |
|---|---|---|
| Most walkable fifth | 90% | |
| Second fifth | 7% | |
| Middle fifth | 2% | |
| Fourth fifth | 1% | |
| Least walkable fifth | 1% |
The city at a glance
On the map, click any street to see its score and the walk to each need.
The most and least walkable areas
Each street cell takes the name of the nearest neighbourhood, village or town on OpenStreetMap, up to 1.5 km away. We rank the 24 areas where people live: each has at least 200 street cells and 160 buildings, and at least a quarter as many buildings per street cell as Barcelona as a whole, so ports, hill parks and farmland drop out. Click a name to open it on the map.
Even Vallvidrera, el Tibidabo i les Planes, the least walkable area here, has 100% of its street cells in the most walkable fifth in Spain. Barcelona walks far better than most of the country, so even its weakest areas beat most other places.
Most walkable
| Area | Typical score | In the top fifth |
|---|---|---|
| 88 | 100% | |
| 88 | 100% | |
| 87 | 100% | |
| 87 | 100% | |
| 86 | 100% |
Least walkable
| Area | Typical score | In the top fifth |
|---|---|---|
| 51 | 100% | |
| 58 | 96% | |
| 61 | 96% | |
| 63 | 98% | |
| 66 | 89% |
Cities like Barcelona
These three cities come closest to Barcelona in number of people and typical score, from any of the 20 countries. Barcelona scores higher than all three.
| City | Country | People | Typical score |
|---|---|---|---|
| Athens | Greece | 2.6 million | 76 |
| Madrid | Spain | 4.5 million | 79 |
| Brussels | Belgium | 1.3 million | 79 |
What this page covers
This page uses the area Eurostat, the EU's statistics office, calls greater Barcelona: the city and the towns that have grown into it. Besides Barcelona itself, it takes in l'Hospitalet de Llobregat, Badalona, Santa Coloma de Gramenet, Cornellà de Llobregat, Esplugues de Llobregat, Sant Feliu de Llobregat and smaller places. About 2.7 million people live there (2024 figure). Inside it we scored 23,116 street cells with 110,257 buildings in them.
Every number here comes from the same scores as the map. The score runs from 0 to 100. The walk to eight daily needs on real streets makes up 60% of it, and how pleasant the streets are makes up 40%. The comparison with Europe counts every place by its buildings, 163,668,724 buildings in all. How the score works.