Beijing ranked 19th in the world's top cities in terms of opportunities, standing out for economic clout, but facing the challenge of high costs, according to a report by PricewaterhouseCoopers on Thursday. While London ranked first, Hong Kong and Shanghai placed 9th and 21st respectively.

The PwC report on the cities of opportunity provided balanced benchmarking of the social and economic health of 30 of the world's leading cities by measuring the cities' performance against 10 indicators, including intellectual capital and innovation, quality of life, transportation and infrastructure, health, economic clout and cost.

It showed that Beijing ranked 19th in the overall ranking, even though it ranked third in indicators of its role as a "gateway" and economic clout and also made significant improvement in indicators of intellectual capital, innovation and technology readiness.