ILGA-Europe’s 2025 Rainbow Map has revealed the most and least LGBTQ+ friendly destinations in Europe.
Malta has been at the top of the ranking for the past 10 years, with Belgium jumping into second place thanks to new policies tackling hatred based on sexual orientation, gender identity, and sex characteristics, overtaking Iceland, which is now in third place. The top ten is rounded out by Denmark, Spain, Finland, Greece, Germany, Norway and Luxembourg.
ILGA-Europe note that marriage equality is only available in 22 countries across Europe, trans people only have legal gender recognition based on self-determination in 12 countries, and conversion practices are only banned in 10 countries. The study examines 49 European countries.
On the other side of the spectrum, the bottom five countries are Russia, Azerbaijan, Türkiye, Armenia and Belarus.
Several countries moved down the rankings, including the UK, which dropped six places to 22nd following the Supreme Court ruling ‘that the terms woman and sex in the Equality Act 2010 refer to a biological woman and biological sex’. Hungary also dropped seven places to 37th after the country banned Pride events.
Katrin Hugendubel, ILGA-Europe’s advocacy director, said, “The big headlines about the UK and Hungary draw attention, but democracy is being eroded quietly across Europe, like a thousand paper cuts. Centre and far-right actors in the EU are targeting NGO funding to weaken organisations that defend rights, while at the national level we are seeing laws introduced that do not address any genuine societal need but are designed purely to marginalise.
“Hungary’s constitutional amendment stating that ‘the mother is a woman and the father is a man’ and that ‘gender is defined by birth’ is a clear example.”
The ILGA-Europe Rainbow Map is released annually, and ranks the 49 European countries based on their legal and policy practices for LGBTQ+ people.
Alongside the wider picture, you can look at individual countries and their laws, with when they were adopted as well as any recent changes since the last report.
The International Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Trans and Intersex Association operates in other regions including Asia, Latin America and the Caribbean, North America and the Caribbean, Oceania, and Pan Africa, but only ILGA-Europe publishes an annual Rainbow Map.
You can find more information about LGBTQ+ policies and protections in countries across the globe on the ILGA World database.
More information: rainbowmap.ilga-europe.org
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