OVER-TOURISM and the plunging pound have taken the shine off some of Europe’s top city break destinations this year.
But there is a new generation of little-known cities that are on the up.
Airbnb has listed the ten, largely unfamiliar, cities that have seen the highest growth in bookings over the last 12 months.
And Post Office Travel Money has compared these up-and-coming holiday hotspots to find out where sterling will stretch the furthest on a city break for two.
Lviv, in western Ukraine has seen the seen highest growth in booking over the past year.
Other relatively unexplored cities, all with direct flights from the UK, include, Tirana (Albania), Katowice (Poland), Kosice (Slovakia), Kaunas (Lithuania), Antalya (Turkey), Bari (Italy) and Alkmaar (Netherlands).
Moscow and Lisbon, the only well-known city destinations on the list, complete the top ten.
Post Office Travel Money looked at the prices of ten items that people would typically pay for while on holiday.
It included a bottle of sparkling wine, cocktails, a three-course dinner with a bottle of wine, a snack lunch, return transfers from the airport to the city centre, a 24-hour travel card, one-day bike hire, top tourist attraction tickets, museum or art gallery tickets, and two nights' Airbnb for two.
It found that Lviv was the best by far for bargain hunters.
At £137 for the ten items, the cost was over ten per cent lower in Lviv than in runner-up Tirana (£153).
It was also a third of the total charged for the same items in Alkmaar (£410), the most expensive of the ten growth cities – but Alkmaar offers the benefit of being close to Amsterdam.
The report also found that the five best value cities were in Eastern Europe.
Katowice (3rd, £192), Kosice (4th, £196) and Kaunas (5th, £237) joined Lviv and Tirana in a clean sweep for Eastern cities, while the port city of Antalya in the Eastern Med took sixth place (£246).
Bari, another port city in the increasingly popular Puglia region of Italy, was rated best value of three Western European cities (7th, £294).
Sun Online Travel previously revealed some short haul destinations that are cheaper this year than last year.
We also revealed the cheapest times of the year to travel according to the mode of transport you're using.
For bargain breaks, you can also check out our round up of the best holiday deals under £99.
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