World university rankings

A list compiled by Shanghai Jiao Tong University which is now widely quoted as a measure in the academic world.

Shanghai Jiao Tong's top 50 universities (last year's ranking in brackets):

1 (1) Harvard University USA
2 (3) University Cambridge UK
3 (2) Stanford University USA
4 (4) University California - Berkeley USA
5 (5) Massachusetts Inst Tech (MIT) USA
6 (6) California Inst Tech USA
7 (9) Columbia University USA
8 (7) Princeton University USA
9 (10) University Chicago USA
10 (8) University of Oxford UK
11 (11) Yale University USA
12 (12) Cornell University USA
13 (13) University California - San Diego USA
14 (16) University California - Los Angeles USA
15 (15) University Pennsylvania USA
16 (18) University Wisconsin - Madison USA
17 (20) University Washington - Seattle USA
18 (17) University California - San Francisco USA
19 (22) Johns Hopkins University USA
20 (14) Tokyo University Asia/Pac
21 (19) University Michigan - Ann Arbor USA
22 (21) Kyoto University Asia/Pac
23 (23) Imperial Coll London UK
24 (24) University Toronto USA
25 (25) University Illinois - Urbana Champaign USA
26 (25) University Coll London UK
27 (27) Swiss Fed Inst Tech - Zurich Switzerland
28 (28) Washington University - St. Louis USA
29 (32) New York University USA
30 (29) Rockefeller University USA
31 (30) Northwestern University USA
32 (31) Duke University USA
32 (33) University Minnesota - Twin Cities USA
34 (35) University California - Santa Barbara USA
35 (34) University Colorado - Boulder USA
36 (40) University Texas - Austin USA
37 (36) University British Columbia Canada
38 (36) University Texas Southwestern Med Center USA
39 (43) Pennsylvania State University - University Park USA
39 (38) Vanderbilt University USA
41 (42) University California - Davis USA
41 (39) University Utrecht Netherlands
43 (44) Rutgers State University - New Brunswick USA
43 (48) University Pittsburgh - Pittsburgh USA
45 (46) Karolinska Inst Stockholm Sweden
46 (41) University Paris 06 Europe
47 (55) University California - Irvine USA
47 (47) University Edinburgh Europe
47 (57) University Maryland - Coll Park USA

UPDATE (17 August, 4:44pm):

As always, university rankings should be taken with a grain of salt. Indeed, the Guardian article from which this list is taken points out that the Shanghai Jiao Tong rankings tend to focus on schools strong in the sciences. Further, excellent individual departments, faculty, and students can be located in mediocre universities and excellent universities can have mediocre individual departments, faculty, and students.