The Mid-2018 Cost of Living Index, produced by crowd-sourced global database Numbeo, ranked the cost of living in Beirut as the 275th highest among 538 cities around the world and the third highest among 20 Arab cities and among 111 cities in upper middle-income countries (UMICs). Based on the same set of cities included in the mid-2017 and mid-2018 surveys, Beirut's rank changed from 248th place in the mid-2017 survey to 241st place in the mid-2018 survey, reflecting a relative increase in the cost of living. The Cost of Living Index is a relative indicator of consumer goods prices, including groceries, restaurants, transportation and utilities. Numbeo benchmarks the Index against New York City. It also issues a Rent Index, which is an estimation of apartment rents in a city compared to New York City rents. Numbeo relies on residents' inputs and uses data from official sources to compute the indices.  

According to the Cost of Living Index, consumer goods in Beirut are more expensive than in Hamilton in Canada, Springfield in the U.S. State of Missouri, and Vancouver in the state of Washington in the U.S., while they are less costly than in Moncton in Canada, Nicosia in Cyprus, and Knoxville in the U.S. Hamilton in Bermuda ranked as the most expensive city in the world, while Thiruvananthapuram in India came as the least expensive city globally. Beirut received a score of 60.79 points, which means that prices in Beirut are 39.21% lower than those in New York City.

In parallel, the Rent Index ranked Beirut in 145th place globally, in fourth place among Arab cities, and in second place to Shanghai among cities in UMICs. Globally, renting an apartment in Beirut is more expensive than in Maastricht in the Netherlands, Brussels, and Adelaide in Australia; while it is less expensive than in Vienna, Barcelona, and Burlington in Canada. Further, Abu Dhabi, Doha and Dubai are the only Arab cities that have more expensive rents than Beirut. Lebanon received a score of 32.3 points on the index, which means that rent in Lebanon is 67.7% less expensive than in New York City. San Francisco has the highest apartment rents in the world, while rent in Bhopal in India is the lowest globally.