The Best City to Visit in South America, and Why Cusco Keeps Winning
Two differently incentivized ranking systems agree on the same answer to the best city to visit in South America. Here's what the data says about Cusco, its runners-up, the safety numbers that don't all point the same direction, and what a day actually costs from Cartagena to Buenos Aires.
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By Mara Fontaine, Fortrip contributing editor — updated November 18, 2025
Mara Fontaine researches and fact-checks South America itineraries, cross-referencing published rankings, national safety indexes, and cost-of-travel data before each piece goes up. Questions or corrections route through Fortrip's editorial team.
Searching for the best city to visit in South America usually turns up contradictory lists built on different incentives. Cusco is the best city to visit in South America by the two most-cited 2025 rankings available, and this piece checks that pick against cost, safety, and landmark data before naming the runners-up.
Why Cusco Is the Best City to Visit in South America
Cusco scored 90.33 in Travel + Leisure's 2025 World's Best Awards for Central and South American cities, published July 8, 2025. That put it at #1 for the third consecutive year, earning the magazine's Hall of Fame status — a tier reserved for destinations that keep winning rather than place once and fade.
Tripadvisor's Travelers' Choice Best of the Best list ranks Cusco first for South America too. The list is built from a full year of community reviews across 8 million listings worldwide, and fewer than 1% of those listings reach Best of the Best status, per Tripadvisor's own criteria. Two sources with different incentive structures — a magazine's reader poll and a review platform's engagement data — landing on the same city is a pattern worth noting, not a coincidence.
The draw is physical, not marketing copy. Inca stonework sits directly beneath colonial facades around Plaza de Armas. Sacsayhuamán, the Inca fortress complex, sits roughly a 15-minute walk uphill from the center, per most Cusco city guides. Rainbow Mountain is commonly cited at about 3 hours away by car. Cusco remains the only practical overland and rail gateway to Machu Picchu, so almost every Peru itinerary routes through it whether or not it's the final destination.
On cost, Price of Travel's 2025 Backpacker Index (published January 6, 2025) puts Cusco's daily cost near US$31.49, with a cheap hostel option around 18.23 soles a night. For a city built on Inca foundations with a UNESCO-listed historic center, that price is lower than what the setting would suggest.
Top South America Destinations After Cusco, Ranked Differently Depending Who You Ask
After Cusco, Travel + Leisure's list runs Mendoza, Lima, Buenos Aires, Bogotá, Cartagena, Quito, Rio de Janeiro, and São Paulo — an order weighted by a reader poll that skews toward wine country and national capitals.
Tripadvisor's order diverges and folds in Gramado and Medellín instead, reflecting a review base weighted toward Brazilian travelers rather than a neutral global sample. Neither list is wrong; they're measuring different populations of travelers. For a closer look at individual stops on either list, Fortrip's South America city guides go deeper than a single ranked roundup can.
Cartagena is the recurring budget Caribbean pick across sources, running close to US$29.02 a day per the same Price of Travel index — cheaper than Cusco and compact enough to walk in a way Bogotá, spread across a mountain valley, isn't. A walkable-city breakdown of Cartagena's Old City covers the neighborhood logic in more detail.
Buenos Aires gets called the continent's most European city in nearly every source, but it's deliberately left without a fixed daily budget figure here. Argentina's 2024 inflation ran near 160% for the year, per the same Price of Travel report, down from far higher rates in prior years. Any specific cost quoted today is stale within weeks. There is no single authoritative 'best city' ranking across these sources. This page treats Cusco as the consensus winner, with six to eight credible runners-up depending on which list you're reading, not a manufactured number one.
Safest South American Countries: Four Rankings, Four Different Leaders
National safety indexes use different inputs and reach different conclusions. Reading one in isolation gives a false sense of certainty.
23 countries weighed against 7 factors: homicide, theft, kidnapping, road safety, and more; Argentina's homicide rate is 3.8 per 100,000, among the region's lowest
Across all four, Uruguay, Argentina, and Chile cluster toward the safer end. Venezuela skews riskier in every version. But none of these four lists is the definitive safety ranking. They disagree on specifics, including exactly where Argentina lands.
Safe Country, Risky Block: Rio, Buenos Aires, Bogotá, Lima Up Close
A national safety index describes an average across an entire country. It says nothing about the specific block a traveler will walk at 9pm.
Travel guides covering Rio, Buenos Aires, Bogotá, and Lima consistently flag petty-crime pockets in those four cities. That's true regardless of how their countries score on the indexes above.
Rio's Zona Sul beaches and Santa Teresa warrant ordinary caution after dark but aren't avoid-entirely zones. Buenos Aires' Palermo and Recoleta read as low-risk. La Boca's tourist strip is fine by day and less so after sunset. Bogotá's La Candelaria is comfortable during daylight and more cautious territory late at night. Lima's Miraflores and Barranco are the calmer districts compared with the downtown core.
'Is this country safe' and 'is this specific neighborhood safe tonight' are two separate questions. If you're stitching several of these cities into one trip, running the route through the itinerary validator is a cheap way to catch a daypack-heavy walk through an area that reads differently after dark than it does on a map. A Bogotá neighborhood guide breaks La Candelaria and the newer northern districts down block by block.
Famous Landmarks and Attractions in South America That Keep Showing Up
Tripadvisor's review-engagement data, Travel + Leisure's editorial picks, and Viator's booking data are three differently incentivized sources. They converge independently on nearly the same shortlist, which is itself evidence the list isn't padding.
That shortlist: Christ the Redeemer, Machu Picchu, Iguazú Falls, Sugarloaf Mountain, Lake Titicaca, the Amazon, Rainbow Mountain, Salar de Uyuni, and the Perito Moreno Glacier.
Iguazú Falls is worth a correction before you pick a side to view it from: per Viator, it's not one waterfall but 275 separate cascades straddling the Argentina-Brazil border, stretching more than twice the width of Niagara Falls.
Rainbow Mountain sits close enough to Cusco — about 3 hours by car, per the same trip-planning guides cited above — that it pairs naturally with a Cusco base rather than requiring its own separate trip.
What a Day Actually Costs: Cheapest South American Countries and Cities
Cusco and Cartagena are close enough in daily cost that the choice between them comes down to Andes versus Caribbean, not budget. Buenos Aires is intentionally left without a number: a fast-moving blue-dollar exchange rate on top of that inflation rate means any figure quoted here would be outdated before you book. Check a live converter at the time of booking rather than this page. Price of Travel's index doesn't cover Medellín or Quito in enough detail to quote a comparable daily figure, so this page skips a number for both rather than estimate one.
Best Places to Visit in South America in December and in August
South America's seasons run opposite the Northern Hemisphere's. December through February is summer across Patagonia and the Andes, and the dry season for trekking Rainbow Mountain and visiting Machu Picchu.
June through August is the dry season in the Amazon basin, which makes it the better window for Amazon river trips. Those same months bring winter to Patagonia, with shorter days and colder trekking conditions.
The two windows don't overlap, which is the practical point. A December trip suits Cusco, Machu Picchu, and Andean trekking. An August trip suits the Amazon and lowland Brazil. Patagonia is better reserved for its own summer window of November through March rather than squeezed into either one. A Patagonia season-by-season guide covers that third window on its own terms.
Quick answers
Cusco or Buenos Aires for a first trip? Cusco for Inca ruins, Machu Picchu access, and lower daily cost; Buenos Aires for city life, tango, and steak culture, with no major archaeological sites nearby.
Cheapest city overall? Cartagena at roughly US$29.02 a day, with Cusco close behind near US$31.49, both per Price of Travel's 2025 Backpacker Index.
Safest country? It depends entirely on which index you trust. Argentina, Uruguay, Chile, and Paraguay each lead at least one of the four rankings compared above — there's no single consensus answer the way there is for 'best city.'
Is 'Latin America' the same as 'South America'? No. Latin America spans Mexico, Central America, and South America together, while South America is the continent alone. This page keeps the two separate throughout.
Planning a multi-city route
If your trip stitches together several of the cities above, Fortrip's AI trip planner can sequence Cusco, Cartagena, or a Patagonia add-on against the seasonal and cost notes in this piece, and the pricing tool handles multi-currency math better than a static page can. These are separate from the editorial research above — use them if useful, skip them if you're planning by hand.
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Frequently asked questions
What is the best city to visit in South America right now?+
Cusco, Peru, by the two most-cited 2025 rankings: Travel + Leisure's World's Best Awards (score 90.33, third consecutive year at #1) and Tripadvisor's Travelers' Choice Best of the Best list.
Is Cusco or Buenos Aires better for a first South America trip?+
Cusco suits travelers after Inca ruins, Machu Picchu access, and a lower daily budget (~US$31.49/day). Buenos Aires suits travelers after city life, tango, and steak culture; it has no major archaeological sites nearby.
Which South American country is safest to visit?+
There's no single answer. Argentina tops the Global Peace Index, Paraguay tops HelloSafe's 2025 index, Chile tops the ArgentinaExpat Latin America Safety Index, and Uruguay has the lowest Numbeo crime score. Uruguay, Argentina, and Chile cluster toward the safer end across all four.
What's the cheapest South American city to visit?+
Cartagena, at roughly US$29.02 a day per Price of Travel's 2025 Backpacker Index, with Cusco close behind near US$31.49 a day.
Is Latin America the same as South America?+
No. Latin America includes Mexico, Central America, and South America. South America is the continent alone, and this page's rankings and data refer specifically to South America unless a source is explicitly about the broader Latin America region.
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