With its skyline rising, Sydney is the seventh leading city for skyscrapers on Knight Frank’s latest Skyscraper Index. Hong Kong came in at number one globally, followed by New York, Tokyo, London, San Francisco, Singapore and then Sydney. While in most cities, skyscrapers are a necessity as a result of limited land availability, Knight Frank says that Australia has a different scenario and it's more a case of changing demographics demanding higher density cities.

Sydney is seeing many office buildings being withdrawn for residential development. Over the next two years, Sydney's skyline will add the triple skyscraper International Towers cluster at Barangaroo, a major dockside redevelopment that will include more than 800 apartments, a hotel, and shops, while Barangaroo South will receive three new residential towers designed by Renzo Piano.

Knight Frank's Global Cities: Skyscrapers 2015 report takes into account skyscraper office rents and yields, the spread offered by investment yields compared to national bonds, the number of high rises built, and growth prospects for the city to rank the world's tallest cities. According to the report, skyscrapers are the optimum means of addressing major economic and geographic challenges facing cities today. Knight Frank’s Head of Institutional Sales for Australia, James Parry, said there is a shift in the global economy towards city centres of gateway cities, and "skyscrapers are successfully delivering the volume and type of homes and offices our cities require."