Navi Mumbai named India's cleanest city as Indore exits top city category; check other cities on the list

Navi Mumbai has been named India's cleanest city in the Swachh Survekshan 2025-26, ending Indore's eight-year run at the top of the national cleanliness rankings. Surat and Vijayawada secured the second and third positions, respectively.

The results were announced on Wednesday at an award ceremony in New Delhi, where President Droupadi Murmu presented the awards to the winners. More than 4,700 urban local bodies participated in this year's survey.

Indore, which had topped the cleanliness rankings for eight consecutive years, was placed in a separate category this time. It secured second place in the newly introduced 'Swachh Shehar Jodi' category, along with its partner town, Depalpur.

Ahmedabad and its partner town Sanand took the first position, while Tirupati and Kuppam finished third.

The initiative is part of a city-to-city mentorship programme launched under the Swachh Bharat Mission-Urban. It pairs better-performing cities with towns that need to improve their cleanliness standards. A total of 72 mentor cities and around 200 mentee cities are part of the programme.

Cleanest cities across population categories

Greater Visakhapatnam topped the rankings among cities with populations exceeding 10 lakh, followed by Jabalpur and Lucknow.

In the 3-10 lakh population category, Ujjain secured the first position, while Chandigarh and Guntur came second and third, respectively.

Among cities with populations between 50,000 and three lakh, Madhya Pradesh's Dewas topped the list, followed by the New Delhi Municipal Council (NDMC) and Sagar.

Maharashtra's Vita was named the cleanest city in the 20,000-50,000 population category. Aska in Odisha and Panaji in Goa secured the next two positions.

Rewa was named India's cleanest riverfront town, followed by Bilaspur and Varanasi.

In the coastal town category, Puri secured the top position, while Kerala's Alappuzha and Maharashtra's Ratnagiri came second and third.

Rudrapur was recognised as the cleanest Himalayan city, followed by Jammu and Shopian.

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How were cities assessed?

The survey assessed cities on 43 indicators across 10 key areas, including waste segregation, collection and transportation, solid waste management, sanitation facilities, visible cleanliness, used-water management and the welfare of sanitation workers.

Cities were evaluated out of 12,500 marks. Of these, 10,500 were allocated for on-ground assessments and citizen feedback, while 2,000 were linked to open defecation-free and garbage-free certifications.

More than 3,000 trained assessors carried out the evaluations using GPS-enabled monitoring and a digital verification system.