The city is classified as a "new first-tier city".

Suzhou, referred to as "Su", also known as Gusu and Pingjiang in ancient times, is a prefecture-level city under the jurisdiction of Jiangsu Province, China. It is located in the southeast of Jiangsu Province and in the middle of the Yangtze River Delta. It is an important part of the Yangtze River urban agglomeration.

The new first-tier cities are ranked by China Business News’ New First-tier Cities Research Institute based on brand business data, user behavior data from Internet companies and urban big data from data agencies, among 338 cities above the prefecture level in China.

The list of new first-tier cities in 2023 has been officially announced. There are 15 cities in the list, in order: Chengdu, Chongqing, Hangzhou, Wuhan, Suzhou, Xi'an, Nanjing, Changsha, Tianjin, Zhengzhou, Dongguan, Qingdao, Kunming, Ningbo, Hefei.