History of the world's tallest buildings
The buildings that were the tallest secular skyscrapers, which excludes religious buildings, were:
The list of tallest buildings is based on the default metric of the Council on Tall Buildings and Urban Habitat (CTBUH), that of measuring to the highest architectural element. Other criteria would generate a different list. Shanghai World Financial Center is not on the above list, but it surpassed Taipei 101 in 2008 to become the building with the highest occupied floor. Using the criteria of highest tip (including antennae), the World Trade Center in New York City was the world's tallest building from 1972 to 2000, until the Sears Tower in Chicago (which already had a higher occupied floor than the World Trade Center) had its antenna extended to give that building the world's tallest tip; a title it held until the 2010 completion of Burj Khalifa. Petronas Towers and Taipei 101 were never the world's tallest buildings by the highest–tip criteria.
List of tallest buildings in Chicago
Chicago, the third-largest city in the United States, is home to 1,315 completed high-rises, 44 of which stand taller than . The tallest building in the city is the 108-story Willis Tower (formerly the Sears Tower), which rises in the Chicago Loop and was completed in 1974. Sears Tower was the tallest building in the world from its completion, and remained the tallest building in the United States until May 10, 2013 when it was overtaken by One World Trade Center in New York City. The second-, third- and fourth-tallest buildings in Chicago are the Trump International Hotel & Tower, the Aon Center and 875 North Michigan Avenue, respectively. Of the ten tallest buildings in the United States, four are located in Chicago. Due to the contributions of Jeanne Gang and Natalie de Blois, Chicago has several of the tallest women-designed towers in the world. , the entire city had 105 buildings at least tall.