Following news that construction on the world’s tallest skyscraper has restarted in Saudi Arabia, we’ve rounded up ten record-breaking skyscrapers, including a Zaha Hadid Architects-designed tower with the world’s tallest atrium.
According to the Council on Tall Buildings and Urban Habitat, recent years have seen a record-breaking number of buildings greater than 200 metres completed worldwide and more than 100 200+ metre buildings completed globally over the last 11 years.
The ten projects below from countries such as the USA, China, Japan and Brazil are current record-holders, having unseated projects in their categories – sometimes by small margins.
Read on for ten record-setting skyscrapers from across the globe.
Tallest residential skyscraper: Central Park Tower (2020)
Located in New York City along Billionaire’s Row, Central Park Tower was completed in 2020 by architecture studio Adrian Smith + Gordon Gill.
It is 472 metres tall (1,550 feet), unseating the previous tallest residential tower, Rafael Viñoly’s nearby 432 Park Avenue skyscraper and contains condominiums at the top, and a hotel and retail on its lower floors.
Find out more about the Central Park Tower ›
Most expensive skyscraper plot: 2 Murray Road (2024)
Architecture studio Zaha Hadid Architects is working on a sinuous skyscraper in Hong Kong on what is reportedly the world’s most expensive plot of land at HK$23.3 billion (£2.3 billion), which developer Henderson purchased in 2017.
The skyscraper is set to be 36-storeys high, with an elevated base that will connect to the city’s network of raised pedestrian pathways and a design informed by a bud from the local Bauhinia plant.
Find out more about 2 Murray Road ›
Longest cantilever: The Link (2024)
The world’s longest cantilever was recently completed in Dubai by Japanese architecture studio Nikken Sekkei, perched between two skyscrapers at the One Za’abeel development.
At 67.5 metres long, the cantilever supports a horizontal volume called the Link, which unseated the 66.5-metre-long observation deck at Marina Bay Sands in Singapore for the title.
Find out more about the Link ›
Largest Passive House office: Winthrop Center (2024)
Architecture studio Handel Architects recently completed what the studio claims to be the “world’s largest Passive House office” in Boston.
The skyscraper reaches 210 metres high (691 feet) and has 167,000 square metres (1.8 million square feet) of floorspace with 21 floors of office space Passive House certified and the rest dedicated to residential and retail use.
Find out more about the Winthrop Center ›
Tallest timber skyscraper: Ascent (2022)
Ascent by American studio Korb + Associates Architects in Milwaukee holds the title of the world’s tallest mass-timber building as of its completion in 2022, certified by by the Council on Tall Buildings and Urban Habitat.
The 25-storey tower has a concrete base, elevator and stair shafts, with the remaining structure made from cross-laminated timber (CLT) and glulam.
Skinniest skyscraper: 111 West 57th Street (2022)
Located in New York City and down the street from the Central Park Tower on Billionarie’s Row, 111 West 57th Street – or the Steinway Tower – by American studio SHoP Architects is the world’s current skinniest skyscraper
The residential building reaches 435 metres tall (1,428-foot-tall) and has a height-to-width ratio of 24:1 – strucutral enginners consider a minimum 1:10 or 1:12 ratio “slender” according to the Skyscraper Museum.
Find out more about 111 West 57th Street ›
Tallest skyscraper in Japan: Mori JP Tower (2024)
American architecture studio Pelli Clarke & Partners designed the Mori JP Tower in Toyko, making it the country’s tallest skyscraper at 330 metres tall and Japan’s first supertall skyscraper.
It is part of the larger Azabudai Hills development, a district that also contains an undulating, gridded building by Heatherwick Studio aimed at creating a central green space for the city.
Find out more about the Mori JP Tower ›
Tallest atrium: Leeza Soho (2019)
Located in Beijing, the 45-storey Leeza Soho skyscraper by UK studio Zaha Hadid Architects contains the world’s tallest atrium.
The tower straddles an underground subway service station, which prompted Hadid to split the building into two halves and use the shear glass atrium as connective tissue.
Find out more about the Leeza Soho ›
Tallest skyscraper in Brazil: Yachthouse (2024)
The Yachthouse skyscraper by Italian design studio Pininfarina was completed in 2024 and its two towers now form the tallest skyscraper in Brazil and the second tallest in South America behind the Gran Torre Santiago in Chile.
The towers mirror each other in design and reach 294 metres high (964 feet), just shy of the 300 metres that denotes a supertall skyscraper.
Find out more about Yachthouse ›
Tallest building: Burj Khalifa (2010)
The Burj Khalifa by Adrian Smith during his tenure at Chicago-based studio SOM remains the tallest skyscraper in the world at 828 metres tall, located in Dubai.
It its completion marked Dubai as a “global powerhouse” wrote Julie Satow in the Wall Street Journal, as explored in a feature on the building written for Dezeen’s 21st-Century Architecture: 25 Years 25 Buildings series.
IFind out more about the Burj Khalifa ›
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