Five of Scandinavia’s higher education institutions have been ranked among the 100 best in the world according to the newest annual assessment by Chinese company Shanghai Ranking Consultancy.
ShanghaiRanking of World Universities 2023
Unlike the QS and Times University rankings, which focus on student life and the experience of studying, the annual ShanghaiRanking judges universities based on their contributions to the academic world, i.e. the number of papers published or cited in journals and the number of accolades alumni have received.
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To create the 2023 study, the firm ShanghaiRanking Consultancy analyzed 2.500 universities from around the world. Each institution was ranked by six key indicators which the firm uses to determine the quality of teaching provided. These include:
- Number of Nobel Price and Field Medal-winning staff and alumni,
- Number of highly cited researchers selected by Clarivate
- Number of articles published in Nature and Science journals
- Per capita academic performance of the university
- Number of articles indexed in the Science Citation Index Expanded and Social Sciences Citation Index on the Web of Science platform
Universities were then given scores out of 100 in each of these categories, with a weighted average of all six used to place each institution on the overall list.
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UK and US institutions still dominate the ranking
As is the case with many university rankings, the top spots on the ShanghaiRanking for 2023 were dominated by institutions in the United Kingdom and the United States. As was the case in 2022, and indeed for the 22nd time since the ranking was created, Harvard University found itself in first place with a perfect score of 100. The rest of the top 10 was filled with the usual suspects:
- Harvard University (100)
- Stanford University (74,8)
- Massachusetts Institute of Technology (69,1)
- University of Cambridge (67,9)
- University of California, Berkeley (63,4)
- Princeton University (60,1)
- University of Oxford (59,5)
- Columbia University (55,3)
- California Institute of Technology (54,5)
- University of Chicago (53,8)
The ranking claimed Harvard was home to the best academic departments in 15 different subjects, ranging from biomedical engineering to political science. The company placed Paris-Saclay University in 15th, the highest place in the ranking which was awarded to a university outside of the UK and US.
Five Scandinavian universities rank in the top 100
Unsurprisingly, Scandinavia’s most esteemed medical university, Karolinska Institute in Stockholm, was the best-ranked among those included in the study. Coming in 37th place (up from 41st in 2022), Karolinska was followed by the University of Oslo, which came in 73rd. On a 78th position came Aarhus University, followed by Uppsala University on 82nd and Stockholm University on 98th.
Best ranked subjects for Karolinska Institute were nursing and pharmacy & pharmaceutical sciences.
Best universities in the Nordics according to the ShanghaiRanking
Overall, these are the 10 Nordic universities that faired best in the ShanghaiRanking:
- 37. Karolinska Institute, Stockholm
- 73. University of Oslo
- 78. Aarhus University
- 82. Uppsala University
- 98. Stockholm University
- 101-150. Norwegian University of Science and Technology – NTNU
- 101-150. University of Gothenburg
- 101-150. University of Helsinki
- 151-200. Lund University, Sweden
- 151-200. Technical University of Denmark
For more information about how the ranking was calculated, check out the ShanghaiConsultancy website.
Five Scandinavian Universities Among Top 100 in the World in new Shanghai Ranking, compiled by Tor Kjolberg
Feature image (on top): Karolinska Institute, Stockholm.