Most international universities in the world 2018: top 200

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Most international universities in the world 2018: top 200 | Times Higher Education (THE)

Published by Mark Kopenski on March 25, 2018

Prospective students looking to study in the most international environments in the world should look to apply to universities in Switzerland, Hong Kong, Singapore, the UK or Australia.

Universities, by their nature, are global institutions. Typically, they are home to communities of students and scholars from all over the world, and they tackle some of the globe’s most pressing problems through research.

But this table, compiled using the international student score, international staff score, international co-authorship score and international reputation metrics collected for the Times Higher Education World University Rankings 2018, shows that the above five countries are home to the 10 most international universities in the world.

These institutions all have a high proportion of international students and staff, collaborate on research with scholars from across the world and have a strong global reputation to match. Read the full methodology here.

Research suggests that diverse communities of students improve the teaching and learning experience while opportunities for students to spend time abroad better prepare them to become global citizens.

Top five most international universities in the world

1. École Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne

It is no surprise that Switzerland is home to the most international university in the world, given that it is surrounded by five countries (France, Italy, Germany, Austria, Liechtenstein) and situated in the heart of Europe.

École Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne has a particularly strong reputation in engineering, with 13 engineering science programmes, and more recently it has become known for its work in the life sciences, and also has strong computer science programmes.

Students at the institution are given numerous opportunities to participate in exchange programmes with other universities in Switzerland and abroad. The university also offers an internship scheme for students enrolled at other internationally acclaimed universities to spend up to three months at one of its campus laboratories.

2. ETH Zurich – Swiss Federal Institute of Technology Zurich

ETH Zurich is located in Switzerland’s largest city, Zurich, which, although expensive, is known for being safe. The main spoken language is Swiss German but the university also offers courses in English.

The institution has more than 19,000 students from over 120 countries and is the top university in continental Europe.

The university focuses on teaching and research in the STEM subjects and 21 Nobel prizes have been awarded to students and teachers at the institution. One of the most famous alumni is Albert Einstein.

3. University of Hong Kong

The University of Hong Kong has embarked on a mission to become “Asia’s Global University”, which includes the goal of 50 per cent of its undergraduates being given two opportunities to study outside Hong Kong during their degree by 2019, and for all students to have this opportunity by 2022.

Overall, Hong Kong’s leading university has more than 20,000 students, with almost 8,000 from abroad.

Teaching at the institution is in English and education has an international focus, with the aim of preparing students to become global citizens who could be successful anywhere in the world.

Hong Kong itself is also known as one of the most global cities in the world, acting as a gateway between East and West.

Applying to university overseas

How international students use social media to choose a UK university
The benefits of an international placement during your degree
Applying to university overseas: what to consider
Applying through Ucas as an international student
A guide for international students choosing a university in Australia
Hoping to apply to a US university as a foreign student?
How to choose a UK university
The cost of studying at a university in the UK

4. National University of Singapore

The National University of Singapore is Asia’s number one university.

Students at the institution have opportunities to participate in student exchanges and enrol in double and joint degree programmes with other leading universities in the world.

NUS also has overseas colleges in Beijing, Israel, Lausanne, Munich, New York, Shanghai, Silicon Valley and Stockholm, which enables undergraduates to undertake internships for up to a year in start-ups overseas while taking classes at a partner university.

In addition, the university has collaborations with two leading US institutions, Duke University (the Duke-NUS Medical School) and Yale University (Yale-NUS College).

5. Imperial College London

More than half of Imperial College London’s 15,000 students are international, coming from more than 125 countries.

Many of these overseas students are attracted to the university not only for its world-renowned teaching and research but because of its location in one of the most international and dynamic cities in the world.

Most international rank 2018	World University rank 2018	University	Country/region
1	=38	École Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne	Switzerland
2	=10	ETH Zurich – Swiss Federal Institute of Technology Zurich	Switzerland
3	40	University of Hong Kong	Hong Kong
4	=22	National University of Singapore	Singapore
5	8	Imperial College London	United Kingdom
=6	52	Nanyang Technological University	Singapore
=6	=130	University of Geneva	Switzerland
8	1	University of Oxford	United Kingdom
9	2	University of Cambridge	United Kingdom
10	48	Australian National University	Australia
11	=25	London School of Economics and Political Science	United Kingdom
12	16	UCL	United Kingdom
13	=153	Technical University of Denmark	Denmark
14	36	King’s College London	United Kingdom
15	=165	University of Vienna	Austria
16	32	University of Melbourne	Australia
17	201–250	Copenhagen Business School	Denmark
18	63	Delft University of Technology	Netherlands
19	91	University of Warwick	United Kingdom
20	=27	University of Edinburgh	United Kingdom
21	=143	University of St Andrews	United Kingdom
22	136	University of Zurich	Switzerland
23	85	University of New South Wales	Australia
24	=34	University of British Columbia	Canada
25	65	University of Queensland	Australia
26	=54	University of Manchester	United Kingdom
27	=117	Trinity College Dublin	Republic of Ireland
28	115	École Polytechnique	France
29	58	Chinese University of Hong Kong	Hong Kong
30	5	Massachusetts Institute of Technology	United States
31	97	Durham University	United Kingdom
32	=80	University of Glasgow	United Kingdom
33	44	Hong Kong University of Science and Technology	Hong Kong
=34	=173	KTH Royal Institute of Technology	Sweden
=34	42	McGill University	Canada
=36	192	University of Auckland	New Zealand
=36	61	University of Sydney	Australia
=38	=119	City University of Hong Kong	Hong Kong
=38	=80	Monash University	Australia
40	=119	University of Alberta	Canada
41	=147	University of Nottingham	United Kingdom
=42	=72	Erasmus University Rotterdam	Netherlands
=42	104	University of Sheffield	United Kingdom
44	108	University of Montreal	Canada
45	=109	University of Copenhagen	Denmark
46	76	University of Bristol	United Kingdom
47	139	University of Leeds	United Kingdom
48	=130	University of Exeter	United Kingdom
49	=182	Hong Kong Polytechnic University	Hong Kong
50	=22	University of Toronto	Canada
=51	6	Harvard University	United States
=51	129	Université Catholique de Louvain	Belgium
53	93	Lund University	Sweden
54	78	McMaster University	Canada
=55	190	Aalto University	Finland
=55	=109	Aarhus University	Denmark
=57	24	Carnegie Mellon University	United States
=57	7	Princeton University	United States
59	=3	Stanford University	United States
=60	171	University of Cape Town	South Africa
=60	201–250	University of Waterloo	Canada
62	59	University of Amsterdam	Netherlands
=63	=38	Karolinska Institute	Sweden
=63	146	University of Oslo	Norway
=65	=134	Stockholm University	Sweden
=65	=83	University of Groningen	Netherlands
67	14	Columbia University	United States
=68	67	Leiden University	Netherlands
=68	=86	Uppsala University	Sweden
70	=72	Paris Sciences et Lettres – PSL Research University Paris	France
71	33	Georgia Institute of Technology	United States
72	88	Free University of Berlin	Germany
73	47	KU Leuven	Belgium
74	60	Purdue University	United States
75	13	Johns Hopkins University	United States
76	19	Cornell University	United States
77	45	Heidelberg University	Germany
78	9	University of Chicago	United States
79	62	Humboldt University of Berlin	Germany
80	=86	Rice University	United States
81	18	University of California, Berkeley	United States
82	=54	University of California, Davis	United States
83	41	Technical University of Munich	Germany
84	53	University of California, Santa Barbara	United States
=85	68	Utrecht University	Netherlands
=85	12	Yale University	United States
87	=34	LMU Munich	Germany
88	99	University of California, Irvine	United States
89	107	Ghent University	Belgium
90	133	Karlsruhe Institute of Technology	Germany
91	140	Pompeu Fabra University	Spain
=92	=147	Autonomous University of Barcelona	Spain
=92	=3	California Institute of Technology	United States
=92	196	Paris-Sorbonne University – Paris 4	France
95	=70	Boston University	United States
=96	201–250	Hebrew University of Jerusalem	Israel
=96	=123	Pierre and Marie Curie University	France
98	94	University of Tübingen	Germany
99	66	University of Southern California	United States
=100	=83	Michigan State University	United States
=100	15	University of California, Los Angeles	United States
102	90	University of Helsinki	Finland
103	17	Duke University	United States
104	=10	University of Pennsylvania	United States
105	79	RWTH Aachen University	Germany
106	=100	University of Bonn	Germany
107	181	Paris-Sud University	France
108	=50	Brown University	United States
109	20	Northwestern University	United States
110	201–250	Tel Aviv University	Israel
111	301–350	Polytechnic University of Milan	Italy
112	501–600	Panthéon-Sorbonne University – Paris 1	France
113	=27	New York University	United States
=114	201–250	University of Barcelona	Spain
=114	191	University of Massachusetts	United States
116	=70	Ohio State University	United States
117	125	University of Mannheim	Germany
118	37	University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign	United States
119	31	University of California, San Diego	United States
120	=126	Arizona State University	United States
121	=159	Texas A&M University	United States
122	21	University of Michigan	United States
123	=25	University of Washington	United States
124	201–250	University of Bologna	Italy
125	251–300	North Carolina State University	United States
126	184	Scuola Normale Superiore di Pisa	Italy
127	98	Emory University	United States
128	=50	Washington University in St Louis	United States
129	=162	University of California, Santa Cruz	United States
130	77	Pennsylvania State University	United States
131	194	Lomonosov Moscow State University	Russian Federation
132	=117	Indiana University	United States
133	=150	University of Notre Dame	United States
134	161	University of Arizona	United States
=135	301–350	Sapienza University of Rome	Italy
=135	43	University of Wisconsin-Madison	United States
137	601–800	National Autonomous University of Mexico	Mexico
138	201–250	Yonsei University (Seoul campus)	South Korea
139	=100	University of Colorado Boulder	United States
=140	501–600	Complutense University of Madrid	Spain
=140	=27	Peking University	China
142	201–250	Korea University	South Korea
=143	=143	University of Florida	United States
=143	=113	University of Virginia	United States
145	172	Rutgers, the State University of New Jersey	United States
146	501–600	Tomsk State University	Russian Federation
147	=56	University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill	United States
148	=111	Sungkyunkwan University (SKKU)	South Korea
149	=169	Nanjing University	China
150	69	University of Maryland, College Park	United States
151	=100	University of Pittsburgh	United States
=152	=56	University of Minnesota	United States
=152	49	University of Texas at Austin	United States
154	251–300	Moscow Institute of Physics and Technology	Russian Federation
155	89	Dartmouth College	United States
156	401–500	Tongji University	China
157	201–250	University of Iowa	United States
158	=105	Vanderbilt University	United States
159	401–500	National Research Nuclear University MEPhI	Russian Federation
160	46	The University of Tokyo	Japan
161	30	Tsinghua University	China
162	351–400	Higher School of Economics	Russian Federation
163	601–800	Waseda University	Japan
164	=74	Seoul National University	South Korea
165	401–500	University of Tsukuba	Japan
166	=198	National Taiwan University	Taiwan
167	=95	Korea Advanced Institute of Science and Technology (KAIST)	South Korea
168	251–300	University of São Paulo	Brazil
169	116	Fudan University	China
=170	401–500	Novosibirsk State University	Russian Federation
=170	201–250	Tohoku University	Japan
172	251–300	Tokyo Institute of Technology	Japan
173	201–250	Osaka University	Japan
174	401–500	Saint Petersburg State University	Russian Federation
175	=188	Shanghai Jiao Tong University	China
176	401–500	Wuhan University	China
177	=74	Kyoto University	Japan
178	401–500	State University of Campinas	Brazil
179	301–350	National Tsing Hua University	Taiwan
180	401–500	Hokkaido University	Japan
181	351–400	Kyushu University	Japan
182	301–350	Nagoya University	Japan
183	351–400	Sun Yat-sen University	China
184	601–800	Keio University	Japan
185	501–600	Harbin Institute of Technology	China
186	132	University of Science and Technology of China	China
187	251–300	Indian Institute of Science	India
188	=177	Zhejiang University	China

Note: To be eligible a university must have at least 100 reputation votes in total (research and teaching) and at least 50 votes from the local country, or 10 per cent of the local voters.

Source: Most international universities in the world 2018: top 200 | Times Higher Education (THE)