Top 10 Tallest Buildings In The World Today

Sally Polly October 01, 2021 | 04:30

To learn more about the list of top 10 tallest and most beautiful buildings in the world, keep reading the article below.

Top10 tallest buildings in the world

For nearly half a century, from 1931 through 1972, the 1,454-foot Empire State Building held the title of the tallest building in the world.

The world has come a long way since then — in the rankings of today's tallest man-made structures, the Empire State Building doesn't even crack the top 40.

In September 2020, an architecture firm and luxury condo building company began constructing what will be the largest residential tower in Canada — SkyTower. It's in Toronto, and at 1,025 feet high, it'll be the city's second-largest building behind the CN Tower.

In this article, we ranked top 10 tallest buildings in the world that will amaze you.

The List of top 10 tallest buildings in the world today

10. Taipei 101

9. CITIC Tower

8. Tianjin CTF Finance Centre

7. Guangzhou CTF Finance Centre

6. One World Trade Center

5. Lotte World Tower

4. Ping An Finance Center

3. Makkah Royal Clock Tower

2. Shanghai Tower

1. Burj Khalifa

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What are the tallest buildings from around the world today?

Top 10 Tallest Buildings In The World Today

The world's tallest buildings include Dubai's Burj Khalifa, which tops out at 2,716 feet. NY Post

10. Taipei 101

Photo: Swedish Normad

Taipei 101, formerly Taipei Financial Center, office building in Taipei, Taiwan (Republic of China). Designed by C.Y. Lee & Partners, a local architectural firm, the skyscraper has 101 stories and reaches a height, including the spire, of 1,667 feet (508 metres). At the time of its official opening in October 2004, it was the world’s tallest building, having surpassed the Petronas Twin Towers in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia. In 2007 it was exceeded by the Burj Khalifa, then being built in Dubai, United Arab Emirates. While under construction, Taipei 101 was known as Taipei Financial Center.

The lowest aboveground floors of Taipei 101 house a luxury atrium shopping mall. Most of the floors above the mall are devoted to office space. The public observatories are on floors 88 to 91, with an indoor observatory on 89 and an outdoor observatory on 91. At a height of 1,285 feet (392.8 metres), the outdoor observatory was the highest in the world at the time of completion. Another indoor observatory, not open to the public, is on the top (101st) floor and is 1,437 feet (438 metres) high.

Construction of Taipei 101 began in 1999. The structure was topped out in 2003, and work was completed in 2004. The largest section of the building, between the base and the spire, consists of eight modules, or groupings, of eight stories each (eight being an auspicious number in Chinese numerology). The building also expresses its distinctively Chinese character in its resemblance to a stalk of bamboo or an elongated pagoda.

9. CITIC Tower

Photo: ArchDaily

The 528 meters CITIC Tower, was inaugurated, standing tall as Beijing’s highest building to date. Designed by Kohn Pedersen Fox Associates (KPF), the supertall innovative architecture remains culturally appropriate, drawing inspiration from the “zun”, a ritual vessel originating in Bronze Age China.

KPF, known for its supertall buildings, with a portfolio that includes 5 of the 11 tallest structures in the world, imagined for the CITIC Tower, a vase-like form, varying from 78-meter-wide at the base to 54-meter-wide at the center and finishing up with 69-meter-wide at the top. The tower’s design suitable for China’s greatest seismic zone meets the ground elegantly. The building puts in place a square plan with rounded corners.

On the ground level, the lobby’s curve creates a dramatic effect, providing a “backdrop to the pedestrian experience”. The unique façade’s expression is introduced in the interior canopy, following the same logic of curvatures. Containing the headquarters for CITIC Group and CITIC Bank, the tower also incorporates office spaces and a multipurpose business center.

CITIC Tower, located in the northern part of the dense region of Beijing CBD, connects to a “vast underground transportation network, linking together a pedestrian passageway system, a B2-level roadway, and four subway lines across three stations”, just like its neighboring buildings.

8. Tianjin CTF Finance Centre

Photo: Wonderful Egineering

Brian Lee, now a consulting partner, practiced in the SOM’s San Francisco office for 28 years before joining the Chicago office in 2007. Lee has designed landmark structures around the globe, including projects in East and Southeast Asia, Europe, and the Middle East. Among his award-winning high-rise projects are the China World Trade Center, the centerpiece of Beijing’s Central Business District, Poly International Plaza in Guangzhou, China, and the 530-meter supertall Tianjin Chow Tai Fook Binhai Centre.

Tianjin CTF Finance Centre dominates the Tianjin Economic-Technological Development Area (TEDA), located just outside Tianjin, the coastal city south of Beijing that is China’s fifth largest metropolis. The sleek tower's undulating curves subtly express three programmatic elements: offices on the broad lower floors, serviced apartments in the shaft above, and a luxury hotel in the tapering top floors. The curtain wall of gently curving glass conceals the innovative structural system of eight sloping columns that increase the structure’s stiffness in response to seismic concerns. Multistory wind vents combined with the tower's aerodynamic shape reduce vortex shedding, which in turn dramatically minimizes wind forces.

Lee’s design approach is focused on achieving full integration of the natural and built environment through the most innovative design forms, materials, and construction technologies. Brian received his BA in Architecture from the University of California, Berkeley in 1976 and his Master of Architecture from Harvard University Graduate School of Design in 1978.

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7. Guangzhou CTF Finance Centre

Photo: Wikipedia

The Guangzhou Chow Tai Fook Finance Centre (also called East Tower) is a 530-metre (1,739 ft) tall mixed-use skyscraper in Guangzhou, Guangdong, which was completed in October 2016. It is the tallest completed building in Guangzhou, the third-tallest in China, and the seventh-tallest in the world. The Guangzhou CTF Finance Centre has a total of 111 above ground and five below ground floors and houses a shopping mall, offices, apartments, and a hotel. The skyscraper has a gross floor area of 507,681.0 m2 (5,464,633 sq ft), of which a little over 20% is not part of the skyscraper itself, but of the podium connected to it.

The Guangzhou CTF Finance Centre is situated on a 27,000 m2 (290,000 sq ft) lot along Zhujiang East Road in Zhujiang New Town, Guangzhou's central business district. In that neighborhood, the skyscraper is located east of the central axis with an underground mall and connections to public transportation underneath it. The Guangzhou CTF Centre is part of the Guangzhou Twin Towers. The other tower of the pair, the 439 m (1,439 ft) tall Guangzhou International Finance Center, is located on the other side of the axis and is also known under the name "West Tower". The Guangzhou CTF Centre is therefore known as the "East Tower" as well. Both towers have a similar height, size, and function, and are situated close to the 604 m (1,982 ft) tall Canton Tower.

The Guangzhou CTF Finance Centre is owned by Chow Tai Fook Enterprises, and houses the world's fastest elevators, which can reach speeds up to 21 m/s (69 ft/s).

6. One World Trade Center

Photo: Getty Images

Standing as a shining beacon for the new Downtown, and a bold addition to the skyline, One World Trade Center is safe, sustainable, and artistically dynamic. Soaring to a symbolic 1,776 feet — it is the Western Hemisphere’s tallest building, and already an iconic New York landmark.

With entrances on all 4 sides of the building, One WTC has been designed to smoothly integrate traffic of visitors & office tenants. The cubic base has a footprint identical to the original Twin Towers. The surface of the base is clad in more than 2,000 pieces of shimmering prismatic glass. The tower ascends 69 stories — its edges chamfered back to form 8 isosceles triangles, a perfect octagon at center. It culminates in a square, glass parapet at the crown, its crystalline form creating a vibrant effect, as light refracts like a kaleidoscope, changing throughout the day. The “One World Observatory” — opening 2015 — is an enclosed observation deck rising 1,250 ft. above street level. The crown of One WTC is a 408-foot spire — consisting of a mast and a communication platform ring. At night, a beacon at the top sends out a horizontal light beam, which can be seen from miles away.

ABOUT THE ARCHITECT

David Childs is consulting design partner at Skidmore, Owings & Merrill/New York. He also designed 7 WTC, which opened in May 2006. Childs is a graduate of Yale College and the Yale School of Art and Architecture, and joined SOM in 1971. Child’s diverse range of completed projects includes Worldwide Plaza on Eighth Avenue; the New York Mercantile Exchange; the JFK International Arrivals Building; the Bear Stearns Headquarters; the Stuyvesant School Bridge in Tribeca; and the renovation and preservation of Lever House.

5. Lotte World Tower

Photo: Getty Image

This 555-meter monument to Seoul’s skyline reaches heights never before seen in Korea and joins the ranks of the world’s top ten tallest buildings.

Elegance of form was one of the prime objectives, following Lotte's desire to bestow a beautiful monument to the capital city skyline. The sleek, tapered form of the 123-story tower stands out from the city's rocky, mountainous topography and is organized around a stacked mixed-use program, comprising retail, office, officetel, and a 7-star luxury hotel. The building's top ten stories are earmarked for extensive public use and entertainment facilities, including an observation deck and rooftop café.

KPF's design melds a modern aesthetic with forms inspired by the historic Korean arts of ceramics, porcelain, and calligraphy. The tower's uninterrupted curvature and gentle tapered form are reflective of Korean artistry. The seam that runs from top to bottom of the structure gestures toward the old center of the city.

The building design is LEED Gold certified, a measure of the client’s commitment to environmental responsibility. Sustainable design strategies incorporated into the design include photo-voltaic panels, wind turbines, external shading devices, and water harvesting systems.

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4. Ping An Finance Center

Photo: KPF

The Ping An International Finance Center is a 115-story, 599 m (1,965 ft) supertall skyscraper in Shenzhen, Guangdong, China. The building was commissioned by Ping An Insurance and designed by the American architectural firm Kohn Pedersen Fox Associates. It was completed in 2017, becoming the tallest building in Shenzhen, the 2nd tallest building in China and the 4th tallest building in the world. It also broke the record of having the highest observation deck in a building at 562 m (1,844 ft).

The building is located within the Central Business District of Shenzhen in Futian. Its 18,931 square meter lot was purchased by Ping An Group via auction at a price of 1.6568 billion RMB on 6 November 2007. Design of the building began in 2008 with Kohn Pedersen Fox Associates providing the architectural design and Thornton Tomasetti providing structural design. Its foundation stone was laid on 29 August 2009, and construction started in November the same year. China Construction First Building Group was hired as the general contractor to construct the building.

On 15 March 2013, the construction process was temporarily halted, due to the suspected use of concrete made with unprocessed sea sand, which could corrode the steel structure. Construction resumed on the building after sample testing.

On the morning of 15 July 2014, upon a 10-meter-long steel column being lifted to place, the skyscraper exceeded 443.8 meters in height, surpassing the KK100 Tower to become the tallest building in Shenzhen.

The building topped out on 30 April 2015, and became the second tallest skyscraper in China at a height of 599 meters. The original plan was to add a 60-meter-long antenna atop the building to surpass the Shanghai Tower and become the tallest building in China. However, in February 2015, it was decided that the antenna would not top the tower due to the possibility that it might obstruct flight paths.

3. Makkah Royal Clock Tower

Photo: Getty Images

Makkah Royal Clock Tower complex, also known as the Abraj Al-Bait Towers, located near Masjid al Haram in Mecca, Saudi Arabia, is a mixed residential and hotel complex. Construction on the complex was started in 2004 and finished in 2012.

The building structure spreads over seven towers erected above podiums. The tallest tower adorned with the Makkah Royal Clock stands 601m-high above ground, which makes it one of the ten tallest skyscrapers in the world.

The massive building was developed as part of the King Abdulaziz Endowment Project, which aimed to modernise the city to offer world-class accommodations for the increasing number of visitors and residents of the Holy City of Makkah.

Saudi Binladin Group is the developer of the Makkah Royal Clock Tower project. The architectural design contract for the complex was awarded to Dar Al-Handasah in 2001.

The Makkah Royal Clock Tower site is spread over 23ha south of the Masjid al Haram. The historic Ottoman-era Ajyad Fortress was demolished to make way for the tower. The complex has a built-up area of 2.8 million square metres (21.5 million square feet).

The seven towers of the building rest on a 15-storey and 115m-high podium, which houses a grand retail area. The tallest tower housing the Makkah Royal Clock Tower Hotel is located in the middle of the building structure. The other six towers – Hajar, ZamZam, Maqam, Qibla and Marwah – are situated to the sides of the clock tower.

The heights of the accompanying towers vary between 200m and 300m, while the number of floors ranges between 42 and 48.

The Makkah Royal Clock Tower Hotel is a 120-storey structure. It is both the tallest hotel and the tallest clock tower in the world. The clock, measuring 43m×43m on each above the hotel tower, stands out as the world’s largest clock face. The clock faces are illuminated by roughly two million LED lights. The clock tower weighs 36,000 tons and is 251m-tall from the base of the clock to the top of the crescent structure.

2. Shanghai Tower

Photo: Viator

Shanghai Tower is a 128-story, 632-meter-tall (2,073 ft) megatall skyscraper in Lujiazui, Pudong, Shanghai. It is the world's second-tallest building by height to architectural top and it shares the record (along with the Ping An Finance Center) of having the world's highest observation deck within a building or structure at 562 m. It had the world's second-fastest elevators at a top speed of 20.5 meters per second (74 km/h; 46 mph) until 2017, when it was surpassed by the Guangzhou CTF Finance Center, with its top speed of 21 meters per second (76 km/h; 47 mph). Designed by international design firm Gensler and owned by the Shanghai Municipal Government, it is the tallest of the world's first triple-adjacent supertall buildings in Pudong, the other two being the Jin Mao Tower and the Shanghai World Financial Center. Its tiered construction, designed for high energy efficiency, provides nine separate zones divided between office, retail and leisure use.

Construction work on the tower began in November 2008 and topped out on 3 August 2013. The exterior was completed in summer 2015, and work was considered complete in September 2014. Although the building was originally scheduled to open to the public in November 2014, the actual public-use date slipped considerably. The observation deck was opened to visitors in July 2016; the period from July through September 2018 was termed a "test run" or "commissioning" period. Since April 26, 2017, the sightseeing deck on the 118th floor has been open to the public. Since its opening, the tower has had significant maintenance issues and remains largely unoccupied.

1. Burj Khalifa

Photo: Klook

Burj Khalifa, Khalifa also spelled Khalīfah, mixed-use skyscraper in Dubai, United Arab Emirates, that is the world’s tallest building, according to all three of the main criteria by which such buildings are judged (see Researcher’s Note: Heights of Buildings). Burj Khalifa (“Khalifa Tower”), known during construction as Burj Dubai, was officially named to honour the leader of the neighbouring emirate of Abu Dhabi, Sheikh Khalifa ibn Zayed Al Nahyan. Although the tower was formally opened on January 4, 2010, the entirety of the interior was not complete at that time. Built to house a variety of commercial, residential, and hospitality ventures, the tower—whose intended height remained a closely guarded secret throughout its construction—reached completion at 162 floors and a height of 2,717 feet (828 metres). It was designed by the Chicago-based architectural firm of Skidmore, Owings & Merrill. Adrian Smith served as architect, and William F. Baker served as structural engineer.

The building, modular in plan, is laid out on a three-lobed footprint that is an abstract rendering of the local Hymenocallis flower. The Y-shaped plan plays a central role in the reduction of wind forces on the tower. A hexagonal central core is buttressed by a series of wings, each with its own concrete core and perimeter columns. As the tower increases in height, the wings step back in a spiral configuration, changing the building’s shape at each tier and so reducing the effect of the wind on the building. The central core emerges at the tower’s top and is finished with a spire, which reaches more than 700 feet (200 metres). The spire was constructed inside the tower and hoisted to its final position using a hydraulic pump. At the foundational level, the tower is supported by a reinforced concrete mat nearly 13 feet (4 metres) thick, itself supported by concrete piles 5 feet (1.5 metres) in diameter. A three-story podium anchors the tower in place; the podium and two-story basement alone measure some 2,000,000 square feet (186,000 square metres) in their own right.