Cover Image: Lake Louise, Canada | Photo by: Unofficial Networks
Above Image: Mammoth Mountain, CA | Photo by: Unofficial Networks
At the start of each ski season, you see several lists from different publications that attempt to rank the best ski resorts worldwide. Often the lists are suspect, with not much reasoning behind why one resort is ranked higher than another.
This is why we have to credit Forbes Advisor, who has developed a methodology for their rankings.
Forbes Advisor methodology:
Ski destinations were ranked on the quality, cost and accessibility of their skiing and snowboarding experience, as well as social factors like their après-ski scene and Instagram worthiness.
Resorts were scored on their relative performance in the below categories using a min-max normalization formula and results were totaled to create an overall index score with a maximum possible score of 100.
The total length of slopes
Length of slopes by difficulty
Number of ski lifts
Ski pass price (Main season adult day pass)
Ski review score
Après-ski scored
After all the numbers were crunched, the writers at Forbes ended up with a very Forbes-type list. Funny that.
Big Sky Resort, MT | Photo by: Unofficial Networks
The Top Ten Ski Resorts In North America *According to Forbes:
#10 Mammoth Mountain – California
#9 Big Sky Resort – Montana
#8 Beaver Creek – Colorado
#7 Palisades Tahoe – California
#6 Breckenridge – Colorado
#5 Park City – Utah
#4 Aspen Snowmass – Colorado
#3 Lake Louise – Canada
#2 Whistler Blackcomb – Canada
#1 Vail – Colorado
So there you have it. If you’re a frequent reader of Forbes, this list will suit you well. It’s not the Top Ten list we would come up with, but based on their methodology for creating the list, the results add up.