The tallest buildings in the world, in order, and the tallest building of every age

Architecture · 4 September 2026

The tallest building in the world is the Burj Khalifa in Dubai, 2,717 feet (828 m) to its tip, finished in 2010; the next tallest are the Merdeka 118 in Kuala Lumpur, the Shanghai Tower, the Abraj Al-Bait clock tower in Mecca and the Ping An Finance Center in Shenzhen, and the tallest in the United States is One World Trade Center at 1,776 feet (541 m). "Tallest" has a definition: the Council on Tall Buildings and Urban Habitat measures to the architectural top, including spires but not antennas, and counts only buildings with occupied floors, which is why the Tokyo Skytree and other towers are listed separately. The record has moved only a dozen times in 4,500 years: the Great Pyramid held it for nearly four thousand, Lincoln Cathedral took it in 1311, churches kept it until the Washington Monument and the Eiffel Tower, and New York held it from 1908 to 1974. Below: today's ranking, the rules, the record over time with what each building is, and the towers now under construction that will change the list. The buildings named are in the Buildings by style collection.

The tallest buildings today, in order

1. Burj Khalifa, Dubai, 2,717 ft (828 m), 2010. 163 floors, designed by Adrian Smith at SOM on a three-lobed plan from a desert flower; the buttressed core lets it stand without the mass of earlier towers.
2. Merdeka 118, Kuala Lumpur, 2,227 ft (679 m), 2023. 118 floors; the spire alone is 525 ft.
3. Shanghai Tower, 2,073 ft (632 m), 2015. A glass skin twisted 120 degrees around nine stacked cylinders, cutting wind load by a quarter; the world's fastest elevators.
4. Abraj Al-Bait Clock Tower, Mecca, 1,972 ft (601 m), 2012. A hotel with the largest clock faces in the world.
5. Ping An Finance Center, Shenzhen, 1,965 ft (599 m), 2017.
6. Lotte World Tower, Seoul, 1,819 ft (555 m), 2017.
7. One World Trade Center, New York, 1,776 ft (541 m), 2014. The tallest in the Western Hemisphere; the height in feet is the year of American independence.
8. Guangzhou CTF Finance Centre, 1,739 ft (530 m), 2016, and Tianjin CTF, the same height, 2019.
9. China Zun (CITIC Tower), Beijing, 1,732 ft (528 m), 2018.
10. Taipei 101, 1,667 ft (508 m), 2004. The tallest in the world from 2004 to 2010, with a 660-ton damper ball inside; in the collection.

Further down: the Shanghai World Financial Center (1,614 ft), the International Commerce Centre in Hong Kong, the Lakhta Center in St Petersburg (1,516 ft, 462 m, the tallest in Europe), the Petronas Towers (1,483 ft, the tallest twin towers), Central Park Tower in New York (1,550 ft, the tallest residential building), the Willis Tower in Chicago (1,451 ft), and The Shard in London (1,016 ft, the tallest in the United Kingdom). About 200 buildings in the world now exceed 1,000 feet, and more than half of them are in China.

How "tallest" is measured

The Council on Tall Buildings and Urban Habitat, the arbiter since 1969, uses three heights. Architectural top includes spires that are part of the design but not antennas, flagpoles or signs; this is the official ranking, and it is why the Chrysler Building, whose spire was hoisted in secret in 1929, beat 40 Wall Street, and why the Petronas Towers, with spires, outranked the Willis Tower, with antennas, in 1998 despite a lower roof. Highest occupied floor rewards usable height: the Burj Khalifa's is 1,918 feet. Height to tip counts everything. A building must have at least half its height in occupied floors; the Tokyo Skytree (2,080 ft) and the Canton Tower are "towers", not buildings, and the tallest of those is the Skytree. Height is measured from the lowest significant open-air pedestrian entrance, not from the basement.

The tallest building over time

1. Great Pyramid of Giza, 481 ft (146.6 m), about 2560 BC. Tallest structure on Earth for about 3,870 years, until its casing was stripped and a church overtook it. In the temples collection.
2. Lincoln Cathedral, England, about 525 ft (160 m), 1311. Its central spire, of timber and lead, held the record until it blew down in 1548. Details in how cathedrals were built.
3. St Mary's Church, Stralsund, 495 ft (151 m), 1549–1647. A Baltic brick church whose spire burned in 1647.
4. Strasbourg Cathedral, 466 ft (142 m), 1647–1874. The tallest surviving medieval structure, holding the record for 227 years.
5. St Nikolai, Hamburg, 483 ft (147 m), 1874–1876. A Gothic Revival church; the spire survived the 1943 bombing.
6. Rouen Cathedral, 495 ft (151 m), 1876–1880. Its cast-iron spire.
7. Cologne Cathedral, 515 ft (157 m), 1880–1884. Finished after 632 years and immediately the tallest building in the world for four years.
8. Washington Monument, 555 ft (169 m), 1884–1889. The first non-church record since the pyramid, and still the tallest stone structure in the world.
9. Eiffel Tower, Paris, 984 ft (300 m), 1889–1930. Almost doubled the record; the first structure over 300 metres; held it for 41 years, although it is a tower, not a building.
10. Chrysler Building, New York, 1,046 ft (319 m), 1930–1931. The first building over 1,000 feet, for eleven months.
11. Empire State Building, New York, 1,250 ft (381 m; 1,454 with antenna), 1931–1970. Built in 410 days; the record for 39 years.
12. World Trade Center, New York, 1,368 ft (417 m), 1970–1974.
13. Sears Tower (now Willis), Chicago, 1,451 ft (442 m), 1974–1998. Nine bundled tubes; the record for 24 years.
14. Petronas Towers, Kuala Lumpur, 1,483 ft (452 m), 1998–2004. The record left the United States for the first time since 1884.
15. Taipei 101, 1,667 ft (508 m), 2004–2010.
16. Burj Khalifa, Dubai, 2,717 ft (828 m), 2010 to now. A jump of 1,050 feet, the largest ever; by the CTBUH's count it holds every category at once.

Among churches, the record still stands with Ulm Minster at 530 ft (161.5 m), finished in 1890 and never overtaken by another church.

What is coming

The Jeddah Tower in Saudi Arabia, designed by Adrian Smith to reach at least 3,281 feet (1,000 m), the first kilometre-high building, was stalled from 2018 to 2023 and resumed construction in 2025; if finished it will take the record from the Burj Khalifa. Beyond it, proposals for 2 km towers exist on paper only. The limits are elevators, which need sky lobbies and changes above about 500 metres, wind, which drives the twisted and tapered shapes of the recent towers, and money: a supertall costs more per floor the higher it goes, and most of the world's 1,000-foot buildings were built in the boom years of 2010–2019. The styles these towers belong to are in architectural styles in chronological order; the Art Deco race for the sky is in Art Deco architecture.

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