Alexandria Makes Southern Living's Best Cities List In 2024

ALEXANDRIA, VA — The South has a wide range of visitor-friendly destinations, and Southern Living thinks Alexandria is one of them.

Alexandria ranked 23rd on Southern Living's The South's Best Cities 2024 list. The magazine describes Alexandria as a "historic" across from D.C. with cobblestone streets, locally-owned boutiques, restaurants and stores.

Southern Living first included the city on its list in 2020 and ranked it 6th on the 2022 South’s Best Cities on the Rise list. It also made the magazine's "South’s Prettiest Cities" and "The Perfect Southern Town for a Hallmark Christmas Movie" lists in recent years.

Visit Alexandria, the city's membership-based organization promoting tourism, has been seeking high-profile rankings like Southern Living to promote Alexandria as a visitor destination and support local businesses. City officials believe more visitors will boost consumption tax revenues and offset the cost to residents. Alexandria has appeared on lists from Travel + Leisure, Condé Nast Traveler, Money magazine and Fortune in 2023.

The South's Best Cities list covered 25 cities. The top five cities were Charleston, South Carolina; Savannah, Georgia; Nashville, Tennessee; New Orleans, Louisiana; and Asheville, North Carolina.