UP Leads Phl Universities In 2024 QS Asia Rankings; Four HEIs Join List

Four Philippine higher education institutions (HEIs) have entered the list of top universities in Asia released by education information provider Quacquarelli Symonds (QS).

The University of the Philippines (UP) obtained the highest score among the 16 Philippine HEIs included in the 2024 QS Asia Rankings released on Wednesday, Nov. 8.

It ranked 78th out of 856 universities in Asia, up from last year’s 87th out of 760 universities. UP ranked 77th in the list released in 2021, 69th in 2020 and 72nd in 2019.

Meanwhile, entering the list for the first time were the Polytechnic University of the Philippines (PUP) at 551-600, Far Eastern University at 701-750 and Mindanao State University at 801+.

The University of San Carlos (USC) in Cebu, which ranked in the 2018 to 2021 editions QS Asia Rankings, returned to the 2024 rankings at 551-600.

Following UP were the Ateneo de Manila University at 137th (down from 134th), De La Salle University at 154th (up from 171st) and the University of Santo Tomas at 179th (down from 175th).

Meanwhile, tied with USC and FEU at 551-600 spots was Adamson University, which improved from last year’s 701-750.

Other Philippine universities in the latest QS Asia rankings list were the Mapua University at 601-650 (from 551-600), Silliman University at 601-650 (from 551-600), Ateneo de Davao University at 651-700 (from 551-600) and Mindanao State University-Iligan Institute of Technology at 701-750 (from 601-650).

They were followed by the Saint Louis University at 751-800 (from 651-700), Xavier University at 801+ (from 651-700) and Lyceum of the Philippines University at 801+ (from 701-750).

Four Philippine HEIs that were in last year’s list did not make it this year: Cebu Technological University, Central Luzon State University, Central Mindanao University and Central Philippine University.

The QS university rankings is based on 11 criteria, which include academic reputation, employer reputation, faculty-student ratio, international research network, citations per paper, papers per faculty, staff with doctorate degrees, proportion of international faculty and proportion of international students.

QS said two indicators not used in global rankings – inbound and outbound exchange students – are used in the Asia rankings to “offer additional insights into the internationalization activity at universities in Asia, assessing the relative size of each institution’s inbound and outbound student exchange programs.”

Only the scores of the top four Philippine HEIs were released. UP obtained 48 out of 100 (from last year’s 47), followed by Ateneo with 34.8 (from 34.7), La Salle with 34.8 (from 29.5) and UST with 31.4 (from 29).

Top universities in Asia

China’s Peking University again took the top spot this year, followed by the University of Hong Kong (up from fourth) and the National University of Singapore (down from second).

They were followed by the Nanyang Technological University in Singapore (fourth, up from fifth), China’s Tsinghua University (fifth, down from third), Zhejiang University (sixth, same as last year) and Fudan University (seventh, up from sixth).

Rounding up the top 10 are South Korea’s Yonsei University (eighth, up from 12th) and Korea University (ninth, up from 15th) and the Chinese University of Hong Kong (10th, up from 12th).

Among Southeast Asian nations, UP is behind 17 other universities: Singapore’s NUS and Nanyang; Malaysia’s Universiti Malaya (11th), Universiti Putra Malaysia (25th), Universiti Kebangsaan Malaysia (28th), Universiti Sains Malaysia (35nd), Universiti Teknologi Malaysia (37th), Taylor’s University (41th), UCSI University (61nd) and Universiti Teknologi Petronas (69th).

The country’s premier university was also behind Thailand’s Chulalongkorn University (44th) and Mahindol University (51th), Indonesia’s Universitas Indonesia (48th), Gadjah Mada University (54th), Bandung Institute of Technology (60rd) and Airlangga University (67st) and Brunei’s Universiti Brunei Darussalam (72st).