No one wants to feel like a tourist these days. Savvy travellers want to live like locals, and that means looking beyond the sights and finding the coolest neighbourhoods to stay, eat, drink and hang out in. But what gives an area that indefinable cool factor? That’s what we asked ourselves when we started to rank the areas that should be on everyone’s travel bucket list right now. To help us out, we went to the experts: local Time Out editors and writers across the world, who know the city like nobody else. We wanted to know: is there a buzz about the area, with cool new venues opening? Can people actually afford to live there? Is it a great place to stay for someone visiting the city? Most importantly, does it feel like a place that’s on the up? After much deliberation we came up with what we reckon is the definitive list of the planet’s cultural and culinary hotspots – the places to be in 2019. Get ready for some serious wanderlust.