For the last 10 years, the World University Rankings published by Times Higher Education have provided an annual measure of the research impact, learning environment and institutional reputation of the leading universities around the world. The first ranking published in September 2010 was dominated by schools from the US and the UK, claiming not only the first 10 places in the international league table with Harvard, Cal Tech and MIT heading the results, but also including 72 US universities and 29 UK universities in the top 200. Only 3 schools from mainland China made the top 100.

A decade later the top 10 places are still filled by universities from the US and UK, with Oxford edging out Stanford and Harvard. But there are now only 59 US universities in the top 200, with 29 from the UK. China now has 6 schools in the top 100.

But as governments around the world look to showcase the international standing of their higher education institutions, one country has quietly maintained it’s position as an HE powerhouse, with 11 universities in the top 200 in both the 2010 and the 2020 THE World University Rankings. Indeed over the last ten years, seven of those universities have risen into the top 100.