Honolulu has moved up to the sixth-best place to open a restaurant, according to a report by Nielsen Claritas. It was No. 7 last year.

The research company annually looks at restaurant sales, income and other factors on a per capita basis to come up with a ranking of cities. Honolulu swapped places with Las Vegas during the past year.

The list was topped by Fort Walton Beach, Fla., which is in keeping with the index favoring markets with significant numbers of visitors, such as those in vacation areas and college towns.

The ranking was published in the April issue of Restaurant Business and gave an index score of 308 to Honolulu. The national average was 100.

The report noted that index scores of top cities had fallen compared to previous rankings, with the average score among top 10 markets falling 40 points from a year earlier.

It said restaurant sales were down more than $5 billion last year, hurting the industry on a sales per capita and sales per restaurant basis.

The article showed Honolulu's 2,523 restaurants generated average sales of $1.01 million each. That worked out to an annual sales total of $2.54 billion.