Best cities to live in Sweden

Hi,

It's not always easy to decide in which area to settle in when moving to Sweden. According to you, what are the best cites to live in?

Which regions offer most of the job opportunities, a good quality of life, an affordable cost of living?

Share with us the cities you would recommend to expats and soon-to-be expats in Sweden.

Thank you in advance,

Julien

Malmö is the best city for expats thinking of moving ro sweden, hands down!

Göteborg is trendy... I like it here!

Really its nice historical city is Goteborg
To live peacefully I recommend you for Goteborg..

Since everyone is just going to recommend their own cities, I fail to see much value here. Perhaps if Julien could give us more of an idea of what he is looking for? Best job opportunities in what field? What is his idea of a good quality of life? What is affordable housing? Is he coming here with a pile of cash or an immediate need to earn?

Wow, you wanna turn this into a PM "value-added" thread. Come to Gbg mate, its cool!

I've been to Göteborg, and you're right, it would be a good choice. So would other cities. What's a PM value added thread?

Goteborg is cool but, then again, so is Stockholm in parts. And what about Umea, a lovely, laid-back town well worth considering. Bet nobody suggests Haparanda!

Do any expats live in Haparanda? :-)

Good question. Who knows?! It's just way too far off in the North. On a more serious note, however, Sundsvall is also a lovely town save for the stench of the inevitable paper mill nearby in the bay!

Göteborg is a hole.  It rains every day.  Malmö is best.  Love having CPH (and a real airport) so near!

Malmö is a nice place. It is just 21 min by train to CPH, plenty of good restaurants, very good international school and a lovely beach with many choices of sports or leisure during the summer.

TOP CITY is obviously going to depend on your personality & interests. If you love the TINY town feel, where everyone knows everyone and you don't want to see another person outside of the 1000 that live in your area then Edsbyn is super cute - OK, you asked about cities so that might not count :-)
Back to the beaten track then, of course Stockholm is an awesome place to live, but you'll need mega bucks to get anywhere central, and none of the more affordable outskirts stick out particularly.
I would say Göteborg is one of the 'friendliest'/ most like UK (attitude) cities in Sweden. There's diversity, Swedes are more outgoing and you're certainly more likely to get friendly service.
Västervik is a cute little place, very quaint and buzzing in the summer. More of a ghost town in the winter. Some people like that! It's also small enough that you'll get to recognize the people that walk around and they're unusually friendly (for Swedes)!
Malmö is a fantastic place, there's an almost Scottish, or more particularly Edinburgh feel to a few of the buildings. The climate's more like UK. Yes, a lot more rain, but the Spring comes about a month earlier there than in Stockholm! 
And how is it possible that nobodies mentioned Uppsala yet? The oldest university town in Sweden, and one of the few cities where you actually feel it. The city is full of bikes, a meandering waterway and viking craft shops!
Västerås is another university city, not quite so quaint as Uppsala but it has it's charm, especially that it's built on a waterfront. It's pretty central, being a short train trip from both Stockholm and Uppsala whilst having a large town feel itself.

Some people are more aware of and sensitive to racial tension than others. In that case it's my experience and understanding that it's the least around the Stockholm/Uppsala/Västerås area and gradually increases the further away you get. Increasing to the North, and even more so to the South - just an extra observation, with no research paper to reference!

Too much information? ;-)

Great information! Certainly not too much! I'm not sure of the comparison between Malmö and Edinburgh though. Edinburgh is charming, but the buildings have this centuries old layer of soot on them that gives it a sad, kind of bleak feel in my opinion and in Malmö they speak much better English! :-)