The top destinations for international association events

The US, which has held the top country position for more than two decades, retained that title with 690 conferences. Photo Credit: Adobe stock/DWP

The International Congress and Convention Association’s (ICCA) annual country and city rankings have resumed after a two-year break and it has released its latest findings for 2022.

About 85 per cent of all meetings held in 2022 were in person, which led ICCA to make the decision to return to normal rankings. More than 10,500 conferences took place that year, 9,000 of which were in person or hybrid.

"The ICCA country and city rankings always generate huge interest," said ICCA CEO Senthil Gopinath. "It’s heartening to see the drive toward in-person meetings is once more very strong, and we predict this trend will grow throughout the coming year."

The United States, which has held the top country position for more than two decades, retained that title, hosting 690 conferences. Spain came in second place (528), followed by Italy (522), Germany (484), France (472), the United Kingdom (449), Portugal (294), the Netherlands (253), Belgium (234) and Canada (233).

In ICCA’s city rankings, European destinations dominated the top 10 and Vienna took home the gold with 162 meetings. The capital of Austria was closely followed by Lisbon (144), Paris (134), Barcelona (133), Prague (129), Madrid (128), Berlin (113), Athens (109), Brussels (108) and London (106).

The top 20 countries for association conferences: