Burj Khalifa

Burj Khalifa in Dubai rises 828 metres with 163 floors and opened in January 2010. It is the tallest building in the world and also holds the record for the longest elevator travel.

Building height counts the spire but not antennas added later. The Council on Tall Buildings and Urban Habitat confirmed the 828 m figure.

Context

Skyscraper height is not a single number, so the Council on Tall Buildings and Urban Habitat publishes formal criteria. The headline measure is height to the architectural top, which includes spires and other permanent design features but leaves out antennas, flagpoles and signage. Burj Khalifa's 828 metres is measured this way, and the council ratified it when the tower opened in January 2010.

The tower was designed by the Chicago office of Skidmore, Owings & Merrill for the developer Emaar, and it was known as Burj Dubai during construction. Its plan is a stylised three-lobed shape that steps back as it rises, which helps reduce wind forces on a structure that tall.

The council also ranks buildings by the height of the highest occupied floor and by the tip of any antenna, and a tower can lead in one category while trailing in another. Skyscrapers elsewhere have since claimed other superlatives, for example the highest observation deck inside a building, so it is worth checking each individual record before repeating it.