Locallista expands to Barcelona, its first market expansion

BARCELONA, SPAIN, July 2025 - Locallista today opened in Barcelona, its first market outside Portugal. The city was chosen for its large, diverse international community: Barcelona is home to an estimated 200,000 expats, according to Locallista’s market research, twice the size of the expat community in Lisbon.

The first step in Spain

Barcelona is also Locallista’s entry into Spain. Across Barcelona, Madrid, Valencia, Málaga and Palma de Mallorca alone, Locallista’s market research counts more than 650,000 expats, a community that needs the same thing everywhere: local businesses it can trust.

The Barcelona launch also tests how Locallista screens businesses and invites its first members in a new city, and will serve as the playbook for later markets.

Built on a strong first year

Locallista arrives in Barcelona after less than a year in Lisbon, where more than 5,500 users have registered and more than 800 businesses have been screened in the process. Locallista.com now runs both cities on one platform, and businesses that meet the standard receive the Locallista quality badge, online and a physical one.

A higher bar from day one

In Barcelona, businesses join only if they are high quality and willing to commit to Locallista’s standards. Every business is vetted before it is listed and reviewed by every client it serves, and there are no ads and no paid placement.

“We constantly receive requests from users asking us to bring Locallista to more cities across Europe,” said Amir Kirshenboim, founder and CEO of Locallista. “That is exactly what we want. We are excited to see the landscape already changing in Lisbon, and we are bringing that change to Barcelona and to every city we will operate in. With this launch, we are building the playbook for further market expansion, as we get ready for more locations in the coming months.”

Expats in Barcelona can join today at www.locallista.com.