Buildings

1. Burj Khalifa:

The Burj Khalifa, known as the Burj Dubai prior to its inauguration in 2010, is a skyscraper in Dubai, United Arab Emirates. With a total height of 829.8 m (2,722 ft) and a roof height (excluding antenna) of 828 m (2,717 ft), the Burj Khalifa has been the tallest structure and building in the world since its topping out in 2009. Construction of the Burj Khalifa began in 2004, with the exterior completed five years later in 2009. The primary structure is reinforced concrete. The building was opened in 2010 as part of a new development called Downtown Dubai. It is designed to be the centrepiece of large-scale, mixed-use development. More details

2. Empire State Building:

The Empire State Building is a 102-story Art Deco skyscraper in Midtown Manhattan, New York City. Designed by Shreve, Lamb & Harmon and completed in 1931, the building has a roof height of 1,250 feet (380 m) and stands a total of 1,454 feet (443.2 m) tall, including its antenna. Its name is derived from "Empire State", the nickname of New York. As of 2017 the building is the 5th-tallest completed skyscraper in the United States and the 28th-tallest in the world. It is also the 6th-tallest freestanding structure in the Americas. More details

3. Taipei 101:

The Taipei 101, formerly known as the Taipei World Financial Center – is a landmark supertall skyscraper in Xinyi District, Taipei, Taiwan. The building was officially classified as the world's tallest in 2004, and remained such until the completion of the Burj Khalifa in Dubai in 2010. In 2011, the building was awarded the LEED platinum certification, the highest award according to the Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED) rating system, and became the tallest and largest green building in the world. It used to have the fastest elevator in the world, traveling at 60.6 km/h and transporting passengers from the 5th to 89th floor in 37 seconds. More details

4. Willis Tower:

The Willis Tower, built as and still commonly referred to as the Sears Tower, is a 110-story, 1,450-foot (442.1 m) skyscraper in Chicago, Illinois. At completion in 1973, it surpassed the World Trade Center towers in New York to become the tallest building in the world, a title it held for nearly 25 years; it remained the tallest building in the Western Hemisphere until the completion of a new building at the World Trade Center site in 2014. The building is considered a seminal achievement for its designer Fazlur Rahman Khan. More details

5. One World Trade Center:

One World Trade Center is the main building of the rebuilt World Trade Center complex in Lower Manhattan, New York City. It is the tallest building in the Western Hemisphere, and the sixth-tallest in the world. The supertall structure has the same name as the North Tower of the original World Trade Center, which was destroyed in the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001. The new skyscraper stands on the northwest corner of the 16-acre (6.5 ha) World Trade Center site, on the site of the original 6 World Trade Center. The building is bounded by West Street to the west, Vesey Street to the north, Fulton Street to the south, and Washington Street to the east. More details

6. Shanghai World Financial Center:

The Shanghai World Financial Center is a supertall skyscraper located in the Pudong district of Shanghai, China. It was designed by Kohn Pedersen Fox and developed by the Mori Building Company, with Leslie E. Robertson Associates as its structural engineer and China State Construction Engineering Corp and Shanghai Construction (Group) General Co. as its main contractor. It is a mixed-use skyscraper, consisting of offices, hotels, conference rooms, observation decks, and ground-floor shopping malls. Park Hyatt Shanghai is the tower's hotel component, comprising 174 rooms and suites occupying the 79th to the 93rd floors, which at the time of completion was the highest hotel in the world. More details

7. Shanghai Tower:

The Shanghai Tower is a 632-metre (2,073 ft), 128-story megatall skyscraper in Lujiazui, Pudong, Shanghai. It also has the world's highest observation deck within a building or structure (Level 121, 561.25 m), and the world's fastest elevators at a top speed of 20.5 metres per second (74 km/h; 46 mph). It is the world's second-tallest building by height to architectural top. Designed by international design firm Gensler and owned by the Shanghai city government, it is the tallest of the world's first triple-adjacent super-tall buildings in Pudong, the other two being the Jin Mao Tower and the Shanghai World Financial Centre. More details

8. Abraj Al-Bait Towers:

The Abraj Al-Bait is a government-owned megatall complex of seven skyscraper hotels in Mecca, Saudi Arabia. These towers are a part of the King Abdulaziz Endowment Project that strives to modernize the city in catering to its pilgrims. The central hotel tower, the Makkah Royal Clock Tower, A Fairmont Hotel, has the world's largest clock face and is the third-tallest building and fifth-tallest freestanding structure in the world. The building complex is metres away from the world's largest mosque and Islam's most sacred site, the Great Mosque of Mecca. The developer and contractor of the complex is the Saudi Binladin Group, the Kingdom's largest construction company. More details

9. Petronas Towers:

The Petronas Towers, also known as the Petronas Twin Towers are twin skyscrapers in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia. According to the Council on Tall Buildings and Urban Habitat (CTBUH)'s official definition and ranking, they were the tallest buildings in the world from 1998 to 2004 and remain the tallest twin towers in the world. The buildings are a landmark of Kuala Lumpur, along with nearby Kuala Lumpur Tower. The towers were designed by Argentine architect César Pelli. A distinctive postmodern style was chosen to create a 21st-century icon for Kuala Lumpur. Planning on the Petronas Towers started on 1 January 1992 and included rigorous tests and simulations of wind and structural loads on the design. More details

10. Ping An Finance Centre:

Ping An International Finance Centre (Ping An IFC) is a 115-storey megatall skyscraper in Shenzhen, Guangdong. The building was commissioned by Ping An Insurance and designed by the American architectural firm Kohn Pedersen Fox Associates. It was completed in 2017, becoming the tallest building in Shenzhen, the 2nd tallest building in China and the 4th tallest building in the world. The building contains office, hotel and retail spaces, a conference centre and a high-end shopping mall. Floor 116 feature an observation deck named Free Sky. More details

11. Trump International Hotel and Tower:

The Trump International Hotel and Tower is a skyscraper condo-hotel in downtown Chicago, Illinois. The building, named after businessman and the 45th U.S. President Donald Trump, was designed by architect Adrian Smith of Skidmore, Owings and Merrill. Bovis Lend Lease built the 98-story structure, which reaches a height of 1,388 feet (423.2 m) including its spire, its roof topping out at 1,171 feet (357 m). It is next to the main branch of the Chicago River, with a view of the entry to Lake Michigan beyond a series of bridges over the river. The building received publicity when the winner of the first season of The Apprentice reality television show. More details

12. Burj Al Arab:

The Burj Al Arab is a luxury hotel located in Dubai, United Arab Emirates. Of the tallest hotels in the world, it is the fifth tallest, although 39% of its total height is made up of non-occupiable space. Burj Al Arab stands on an artificial island 280 m (920 ft) from Jumeirah Beach and is connected to the mainland by a private curving bridge. The shape of the structure is designed to resemble the sail of a ship. It has a helipad near the roof at a height of 210 m (689 ft) above ground. The Burj Al Arab was designed by multidisciplinary consultancy Atkins led by architect Tom Wright, who has since become co-founder of WKK Architects. More details

13. Marina Bay Sands:

Marina Bay Sands is an integrated resort fronting Marina Bay in Singapore, owned by the Las Vegas Sands corporation. At its opening in 2010, it was billed as the world's most expensive standalone casino property at S$8 billion, including the land cost. The resort, designed by Moshe Safdie, includes a 2,561-room hotel, a 120,000-square-metre (1,300,000 sq ft) convention-exhibition centre, the 74,000-square-metre (800,000 sq ft) The Shoppes at Marina Bay Sands mall, a museum, two large theatres, "celebrity chef" restaurants, two floating Crystal Pavilions, art-science exhibits, and the world's largest atrium casino with 500 tables and 1,600 slot machines. More details

14. Bahrain World Trade Center:

The Bahrain World Trade Center (also called Bahrain WTC or BWTC) is a 240-metre-high (787 ft), 50-floor, twin tower complex located in Manama, Bahrain. Designed by the multi-national architectural firm Atkins, construction on the towers was completed in 2008. It is the first skyscraper in the world to integrate wind turbines into its design. The wind turbines were developed, built and installed by the Danish company Norwin A/S. The structure is constructed close to the King Faisal Highway, near popular landmarks such as the towers of Bahrain Financial Harbour (BFH), NBB and Abraj Al Lulu. More details

15. One57:

One57, formerly known as Carnegie 57 and nicknamed "The Billionaire Building", is a 75-story supertall skyscraper at 157 West 57th Street between Sixth and Seventh Avenues in the Midtown neighborhood of Manhattan, New York City. Upon completion in 2014, it stood at 1,005 feet (306 m) tall, making it the tallest residential building in the city for a few months until the completion of 432 Park Avenue. The building has 92 condominium units on top of a new Park Hyatt Hotel with 210 rooms, which is set to become the flagship Hyatt property. More details

16. Torre Mayor:

The Torre Mayor is a skyscraper in Mexico City, Mexico. With a height of 225 metres (738 feet) to the top floor and 55 stories, it is the third tallest building in Mexico. It was surpassed in height by Torre BBVA Bancomer in 2015, which in turn was surpassed by Torre Reforma. From its completion in 2003 until 2010 (when it was surpassed by the residential 236 meter (774 ft) high Ocean Two in Panama City, Panama) it was also the tallest building in Latin America. The Torre Mayor was developed by Canadian businessman Paul Reichmann, who also maintained part ownership until his death in 2013. It is also part-owned by a group of institutional investors. More details

17. Commerzbank Tower:

Commerzbank Tower is a 56-story, 259 m (850 ft) skyscraper owned by Samsung of Korea since September 2016 in the banking district of Frankfurt, Germany. An antenna spire with a signal light on top gives the tower a total height of 300.1 m (985 ft). It is the tallest building in Frankfurt and the tallest building in Germany. It had been the tallest building in Europe from its completion in 1997 until 2003 when it was surpassed by the Triumph-Palace in Moscow. Since the departure of the United Kingdom from the European Union, the tower has reclaimed its position as the tallest building in the European Union. More details

18. Woolworth Building:

The Woolworth Building is an early American skyscraper designed by architect Cass Gilbert and located at 233 Broadway in Manhattan, New York City. It was the tallest building in the world from 1913 to 1930, with a height of 792 feet (241 m). More than a century after its construction, it remains one of the 100 tallest buildings in the United States. The Woolworth Building is located in Manhattan's Tribeca neighborhood, bounded by Broadway and City Hall Park to its east, Park Place to its north, and Barclay Street to its south. It consists of a 30-story tower atop a 30-story base. Its facade is mostly decorated with terracotta, though the lower portions are limestone, and it features thousands of windows. More details

19. Cira Centre:

The Cira Centre is a 29-story, 437-foot (133 m) office high-rise in the University City section of Philadelphia, directly connected to Amtrak's 30th Street Station. Developed by Brandywine Realty Trust and designed by César Pelli, it was built in 2004-05 on a platform over rail tracks. The building, a silver glass curtain wall skyscraper with 731,852 square feet (68,000 m2) of floor space, includes retail and restaurant space, a conference room, a nine-story parking garage and a pedestrian bridge that links the lobby with 30th Street Station. The building's lighting, designed by Cline Bettridge Bernstein Lighting Design, includes a wall of LEDs on most of its facade that can change color to create various patterns and effects. More details

20. Eureka Tower:

Eureka Tower is a 297.3 m (975 ft) skyscraper located in the Southbank precinct of Melbourne, Victoria, Australia. Construction began in August 2002 and the exterior was completed on 1 June 2006. The plaza was finished in June 2006 and the building was officially opened on 11 October 2006. The project was designed by Melbourne architectural firm Fender Katsalidis Architects and was built by Grocon (Grollo Australia). The developer of the tower was Eureka Tower Pty Ltd, a joint venture consisting of Daniel Grollo (Grocon), investor Tab Fried and one of the Tower's architects Nonda Katsalidis. It was the world's tallest residential tower when measured to its highest floor, until surpassed by Ocean Heights and the HHHR Tower in Dubai. More details

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