UCT in top 1.4% of universities worldwide

The University of Cape Town (UCT) is the best university on the continent and 270th worldwide, according to the 2022-23 edition of the Global 2000 list from the Center for World University Rankings (CWUR), published today.

CWUR releases the largest academic ranking of global universities. This year, it assessed almost 20 000 institutions. Of those, only the best 2 000 receive a ranking. UCT’s ranking of 270th out of the 20 000 that were assessed places it in the top 1.4% of universities worldwide.

The ranking uses seven indicators grouped into four areas:

• Education, measured by the number of a university’s alumni who have won major academic distinctions relative to the university’s size (25%).
• Employability, measured by the number of a university’s alumni who have held top executive positions at the world’s largest companies relative to the university’s size (25%).
• Faculty, measured by the number of faculty members who have won major academic distinctions (10%).
• Research (40%), made up of:
  1. Research output, measured by the total number of research articles (10%)
  2. High-quality publications, measured by the number of research articles appearing in top-tier journals (10%)
  3. Influence, measured by the number of research articles appearing in highly influential journals (10%)
  4. Citations, measured by the number of highly cited research articles (10%).

UCT’s best performance indicator is alumni employment, which continues to climb – as evidenced by a jump up of 23 places from last year, which in turn was 18 places up on the previous year.

The leading three universities according to the latest CWUR list are the same as last year: Harvard University followed by the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) and Stanford University (all in the United States).

Review the Center for World University Rankings 2022-23 Global 2000 list.

Read more about the methodology used by the Center for World University Rankings.