All people want to enjoy a long and happy retirement after a lifetime of work, but with the quality of life in our later years heavily depending on personal pension schemes, savings, and access to social and health programs, many could find themself struggling to afford to enjoy their twilight years.

One’s place of residence can also have an enormous effect on the quality of his or her retirement.

Various countries, or even states within the Unites States, can differ dramatically in terms of happiness, life expectancy, retirement age, quality of healthcare and many other aspects.

New research has revealed the best countries around the world to spend your retirement and the USA doesn’t even make the top 10, ranking in 24th place.

The study has analyzed countries around the world on eight factors including average life expectancy, pension age and quality of support network to reveal the best places to retire.

The top 10 places to retire in the world:

Rank	Country	Average Life Expectancy	Pension Age	Int’l Retirement Score
1	Iceland	82.77	67	8.11
2	Luxembourg	81.99	62	7.96
3	Norway	82.18	67	6.86
4	Austria	81.32	65	6.64
4	Sweden	82.56	65	6.64
6	Spain	83.32	65	6.54
6	Switzerland	83.51	65	6.54
8	Finland	81.64	68	6.50
9	Netherlands	82.05	69	6.43
10	France	82.40	66	6.39

The United States of America ranked 24th with an international retirement score of 4.25. The US scores varied across the factors – for example, results were average for life satisfaction (7/10) and average elderly income of the average wage (93.8%). However, low results brought down rankings for the gross pension replacement rate (39.2%) and the 9th lowest average life expectancy (78) in the world.

The best country in the world for retirement is Iceland with an international retirement score of 8.11. Iceland has one of the lowest rates of old-age income poverty at 3.05% and elderly incomes are just shy of the national average wage at 95.04%.

The second-best country is Luxembourg with an international retirement score of 7.96. Luxembourg is a small European nation that boasts the highest elderly income in the world, higher than typical worker wages at 107.77% and has a low pension age of 62.

The third country is Norway with an international retirement score of 6.86. Norway has a long average life expectancy and low levels of old-age income poverty at 4.34%.

Further Study Insights

The top 3 rankings are all European countries, but the research also looks at the best states in the United States for retirement. The top 3 states for retiring in the US are Delaware, Washington and Oregon & Wisconsin.

The happiest retirees in the world are located in Finland, where they have a high-quality support network and a gross pension replacement rate of 56.6%.

People work for the longest period of their lives in Denmark, with the highest pension age. However, Denmark also has the lowest rate of old-age income poverty in the world.