When you think of the most prestigious universities in the world, the first to come to mind will probably be names from the other side of the globe. But there's one university right here in our city that is just as esteemed as the likes of Yale or Princeton. In fact, in a new global list of the world's best university, our very own University of Melbourne outranked both of those well-known institutions. Feel that city pride!
The prestigious QS World University Rankings for 2026 have just dropped, revealing which institutions stand in the best stead for the year ahead. Two Australian universities cracked the top 20 for yet another year, out of more than 1,500 institutions from around the world assessed for the 2026 rankings, including 36 from Australia. The top five were pretty similar to last year, with MIT holding onto first place with a perfect score of 100, followed by Imperial College London, Stanford, Harvard and Cambridge.
Australia’s highest-ranked institution was the University of Melbourne, which landed 19th on the global list. While it slipped six spots from placing 13th in 2025, its overall score actually rose 1.9 points to 90.8 – thanks to improved ratings in seven of the nine ranking indicators. The uni earned a near-perfect 99.7 for academic reputation (the highest in Australia) and also ranked first in the country for employer reputation and sustainability. This university is consistently praised as the best in the country, and was also named as one of the top ten most sustainable universities worldwide last year.
Just one position behind was the University of New South Wales (UNSW), which held onto its place among the top 20 universities in the world for the third consecutive year. Its overall score of 90.7 saw it drop one position from 19th in 2025, but it maintained impressive ratings for academic reputation (96.3) and ranked equal 12th in the world for sustainability. Of the 36 Australian institutions assessed, UNSW placed first in the employment outcome and international research network categories.
Overall, two-thirds of Australia’s ranked universities dropped in this year’s rankings. Meanwhile, only seven climbed higher, including Monash University’s jump from 37th to 36th. The University of Sydney slipped out of the top 20, landing at 25th, with the Australian National University and the University of Queensland also dropping two spots to 32nd and 42nd, respectively.
Despite the overall decline, we think it's still pretty impressive that one of our city's universities made the top 20 worldwide. You can check out the full rankings here.
Here are the 20 best universities in the world
- Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), USA
- Imperial College London, UK
- Stanford University, USA
- University of Oxford, UK
- Harvard University, USA
- University of Cambridge, UK
- ETH Zurich, Switzerland
- National University of Singapore, Singapore
- University College London, UK
- California Institute of Technology, USA
- The University of Hong Kong, Hong Kong
- Nanyang Technological University, Singapore
- University of Chicago, USA
- Peking University, China
- University of Pennsylvania, USA
- Cornell University, USA
- Tsinghua University, China
- University of California, Berkeley, USA
- University of Melbourne, Australia
- University of New South Wales, Australia
Stay in the loop: sign up for our free Time Out Melbourne newsletter for the best of the city, straight to your inbox.