Sligo named the cleanest town in Ireland as Waterford claims city accolade

There was good news for Cork previous blackspot Mahon, but the city's Northside finished fouth from bottom in the rankings 

Sligo Town has topped the IBAL rankings, followed by Leixlip in second place. File picture

Sligo has been named the cleanest town in Ireland, but there was less good news for Cork's Northside in the Irish Business Against Litter (IBAL) rankings.

Released on Monday, the rankings placed the Cork Northside fourth from bottom, deeming the area to be littered. It finished ahead of only Dublin's Ballymun, Ballybane in Galway's inner city, and Dublin North inner city.

There was better news for other Cork areas, though, as previous blackspot Mahon and Cork City Centre saw improvements from last year, finishing 18th and 27th respectively. Both areas were said to be clean when compared to European norms. 

At the top of the rankings, Sligo was classed as being "cleaner than European norms" as An Taisce, which conducts the surveys on behalf of IBAL, lauded the winning town for its consistently strong performance in recent years.

They pointed out how the Quayside shopping centre was “absolutely spotless throughout”, while the bus and train stations came in for praise, as did Grattan and Castle St. Adelaide St Car Park was much improved on past surveys, they added.

“Sligo has come such a long way from back in 2007, when the town was bottom of our rankings, and labelled a litter blackspot,” said IBAL’s Conor Horgan. 

It is an illustration of the turnabout that is possible, even in a large town, when council and community come together.

Leixlip (2nd) and Westport (3rd) narrowly missed out on top spot, with Monaghan and Tullamore rounding out the top five. The IBAL highlighted that there was good news as no town or city was judged to be “seriously littered”.

"The most pleasing finding of 2025 was the progress made in socially disadvantaged areas. Even areas at the foot of our rankings have significantly lower litter levels than a year ago," said Mr Horgan.

Meanwhile, Waterford reclaimed the accolade of Ireland’s cleanest city, winning for the third time in four years, ahead of Galway in 2nd.

10 of the 13 areas surveyed showed an improvement in cleanliness on 2024 with Galvone in Limerick achieving clean status for the first time after being branded as 'seriously littered' for years.

The survey also revealed that the Deposit Return Scheme continues to have a positive impact on the cleanliness of Irish towns and cities. 

There has been a 10% drop in the prevalence of cans and plastic bottles compared to the previous year. These two types of litter are now 60% less common than when the scheme was introduced in early 2024.

Coffee cups remains one of the most commonly found forms of litter and was evident in one fifth of all sites surveyed while the prevalence of disposable vapes, which are set to be outlawed over the course of 2026, was unchanged.

2025 IBAL anti-litter league results 

1	Sligo	Cleaner than European norms
2	Leixlip	Cleaner than European norms
3	Westport	Cleaner than European norms
4	Monaghan	Cleaner than European norms
5	Tullamore	Cleaner than European norms
6	Waterford City	Cleaner than European norms
7	Killarney	Cleaner than European norms
8	Letterkenny	Cleaner than European norms
9	Galway City Centre	Cleaner than European norms
10	Wexford	Cleaner than European norms
11	Dun Laoghaire	Clean to European norms
12	Roscommon	Clean to European norms
13	Naas	Clean to European norms
14	Mullingar	Clean to European norms
15	Ennis	Clean to European norms
16	Tralee	Clean to European norms
17	Kilkenny	Clean to European norms
18	Mahon - Cork City	Clean to European norms
19	Cavan	Clean to European norms
20	Wicklow	Clean to European norms
21	Fermoy	Clean to European norms
22	Longford	Clean to European norms
23	Ballybeg	Clean to European norms
24	Dublin Airport Environs	Clean to European norms
25	Portlaoise	Clean to European norms
26	Limerick City South - Galvone	Clean to European norms
27	Cork City Centre	Clean to European norms
28	Tallaght	Clean to European norms
29	Drogheda	Moderately littered
30	Navan	Moderately littered
31	Dublin City Centre	Moderately littered
32	Athlone	Moderately littered
33	Limerick City Centre	Moderately littered
34	Dundalk	Moderately littered
35	Carlow	Moderately littered
36	Clonmel	Moderately littered
37	Cork Northside	Littered
38	Ballymun	Littered
39	Galway Inner City - Ballybane	Littered
40	Dublin North Inner City	Littered