For those who live in Melbourne it’s no surprise the city has been named the world’s most liveable city for the fifth consecutive year.

While 20 per cent of the cities surveyed by the magazine’s Intelligence Unit experienced declines in liveability over the past year, Australian cities were found to be “a relative picture of stability”.

It is the fifth year in a row the Victorian state capital has out-matched global rivals in livability.

Austrian capital Vienna (97.4 points), Canada’s Vancouver (97.3) and Toronto (97.2) closely followed Melbourne. It lost out to Adelaide and Melbourne due to its lower score for culture and environment, and stability.

Canadians have also hit the liveability jackpot, with Alberta’s capital of Calgary coming in joint-fifth with Adelaide, while Vancouver in the west of the country and the eastern city of Toronto were named as third and fourth respectively.

Melbourne is in a constant battle with its more lovely sister city, Sydney, which came in at No. 7 on the list.

Premier Daniel Andrews said Melbourne was the only country in the world to get the title five times.

By contrast, some regions have bucked the trend – seven Chinese cities improved their ranking over the last 12 months “largely because of a lower threat from civil unrest”, the report said.

Committee of Melbourne chief executive Kate Roffey quickly seized on the The Economist survey as the best recognised standard of liveability among global cities.

“Conflict will not just cause disruption in its own right, it will also damage infrastructure, overburden hospitals and undermine the availability of goods, services and recreational activities”, the report stated.

She said while Melbourne ranked well in both The Economist survey and a recent ranking by Monocle magazine – in which the city was in the top five – Melbourne still had much to do regarding “city-shaping infrastructure projects, maximising access to jobs… and making sure we remain a liveable city for everyone by providing more affordable housing”. Sydney just made the cut at number 10.