Oxford tops University of the Year table for first time in 12 years

Oxford tops University of the Year league table for first time in 12 years ahead of St Andrews, Cambridge and LSE

• Oxford is rated at the UK’s best university for the first time in over a decade
• The Times’ University of the Year Good University Guide 2023 has been released
• The university of the year title was won by Bath, who came in eighth place

The University of Oxford has reclaimed its top spot in a UK-wide league table after 12 years, beating the likes of Cambridge and London School of Economics.

Although Oxford did miss out on The Times and The Sunday Times’ University of the Year title, which was won by the University of Bath.

Second place went to the University of St Andrews, last year’s winners, and the University of Cambridge came in third.

The universities are rated on a number of factors, including ‘Teaching excellence’, ‘Student satisfaction’ and how many graduates end up in professional jobs or graduate-level study.

Oxford performed superbly across all academic measures and demonstrated by far the lowest student-to-staff ratio (10.5:1). 

The top university came first for 2:1s and Firsts with 94.5 per cent, it came joint first for completion rate of 99 per cent and ranked fourth for graduate prospects with 91.6 per cent of graduates in professional jobs or doing graduate study. 

The University of Oxford has returned to the top of The Times and Sunday Times’ Good University Guide after 12 years

Last year’s top spot-holders, the University of Saint Andrews, Edinburgh, slipped  just one place

Cambridge University came in third place for the second year running, despite being the top university for several years in a row before

Author Zoe Thomas told the Oxford Mail: ‘The reason that Oxford edged it this year in particular is its extremely low staff to student ratio. At Oxford there are 10.5 students per member of academic staff, and that’s staff with responsibility for teaching. That’s way above anybody else.

‘It speaks very clearly of their tradition of having a don and up to two other students.’

Ms Thomas added: ‘The extraordinary work on the Astra Zeneca Covid vaccine can not be overlooked but it was not part of our methodology. Still it is part of the rich profile that it brings to everything that it does.’

Professor Dame Louise Richardson, Vice-Chancellor of the University of Oxford, said: ‘My colleagues and I are delighted by this news. It is a testament to the talent and commitment of staff all across the collegiate university as well as to the creativity and resilience of our students who refused to allow a pandemic to derail their education.’

London School of Economics and Political Science made the top five

Imperial College London came fifth and had the highest score for graduate prospects

Durham University took sixth place and has been named the Sports University of the Year

The University of Bath missed out on the top 5, but ranked eighth in the overall league tables, up from ninth in 2021.

Bath won this year’s coveted University of the Year award on account of its strength across the board.

It was the fourth-highest institution for student satisfaction and fifth-highest for graduate prospects, and received a record numbers of applicants in the 2021 and 2022 admissions cycles.

The Times’ top 10 universities in the UK 

1 OXFORD

2 ST ANDREWS

3 CAMBRIDGE

4 LSE

5 IMPERIAL

6 DURHAM

7 UNIVERSITY COLLEGE LONDON

8 UNIVERSITY OF BATH

9 UNIVERSITY OF WARWICK

10 UNIVERSITY OF EDINBURGH

Exeter was runner-up for University of the Year, having nearly doubled its enrolments over the past decade, while Birmingham, Oxford and Surrey were also shortlisted.

Durham has been named the Sports University of the Year. As third in the British University and Colleges Sport league for 2021-22, and first for producing professional sports stars (141), Durham’s collegiate structure encourages high participation rates throughout the university.

Fifth place Imperial College London had the highest score for graduate prospects at 95.2 per cent of students going on to a high-skilled jobs or graduate-level study. 

In the Scottish version of the league table, the University of Edinburgh came second – the institution was 10th UK-wide, while third position went to the University of Glasgow, ranked 14th in Britain.

The Queen’s granddaughter Lady Louise Windsor is to attend St Andrews, second place, to study English.

Lady Louise – the 18-year-old daughter of the Earl and Countess of Wessex – starts her degree course this year.

The guide provides rankings for UK universities based on their performance in a number of key areas for undergraduates.

These cover student satisfaction with the quality of their teaching and academic feedback, graduate job prospects, the likelihood of achieving a high-class degree, entry standards, dropout rates, research quality and student/staff ratio.

There are also 70 subject tables, highlighting centres of excellence. These tables are based on an analysis of student satisfaction with teaching quality and their student experience, entry standards, research quality and graduate prospects.

There is no institutional-level data available this year for the universities of Cambridge and Oxford from the National Student Survey (NSS).

There are no scores, therefore, for either university for teaching quality or student experience in this year’s Good University Guide tables, which are derived from NSS performance. 

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