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The purpose of this study is to develop a list of building sustainability criteria and prioritize them in order to identify the most important ones for the context of the United Arab Emirates (UAE). This study also aims to assess buildings as heritage, ordinary modern or sustainable modern buildings with respect to defined sustainability criteria, using the Analytical Hierarchy Process (AHP). Comparing sustainability aspects in both heritage and modern buildings can clarify which ones use more sustainability principles and this can integrate the best principles in both heritage and modern buildings to produce new buildings with better performance. The methodological approach is survey-based, using the answers obtained through questionnaires. Based on a literature review, the main criteria and sub-criteria were defined. A comparison of the relative importance between the rating criteria was made within the framework of the AHP, based on expert opinion, that would allow unambiguous prioritization of the decision-making factors and lead to a consistent result. The study assumes that all participants in the survey are experts who have knowledge of sustainability and buildings and their answers were truthful and reliable. The opinions of stakeholders, owners and building occupants were not taken into consideration. This research contributes to the field of building industry and sustainability. It broadens the understanding of sustainability assessment criteria as well as the degree of importance and validity of each criterion applied to assess the level of sustainability of heritage and modern buildings in the UAE. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]