In the 2024 Times Higher Education World University Rankings, the University of Cape Coast has once again secured the top position as the premier university in both Ghana and West Africa.
In the 2022 and 2023 rankings, the university was celebrated as the best in Ghana, leading in West Africa, ranking fourth in Africa, and excelling as the world’s foremost university for research influence.
In the latest 2024 rankings just released, the University of Cape Coast still holds the distinction of being the premier university in Ghana and West Africa, although it has slipped slightly from its fourth position in Africa to the seventh.
The Times Higher Education World University Rankings 2024 encompasses 1,904 universities from various countries and regions.
These rankings are based on the new WUR 3.0 methodology, which evaluates institutions using 18 meticulously calibrated performance indicators that gauge performance in five key areas: teaching, research environment, research quality, industry engagement, and international outlook.
This year’s ranking involved the analysis of more than 134 million citations across 16.5 million research publications and included survey responses from 68,402 scholars globally.
In total, 411,789 data points were collected from over 2,673 institutions that submitted data.
The Times Higher Education World Universities Ranking is highly regarded worldwide and is trusted by students, educators, governments, and industry experts. The 2024 league table provides insights into the shifting landscape of global higher education.
On a global scale, the University of Oxford maintained its top position for the eighth consecutive year, but there have been changes in the ranks of the top five universities. Stanford University moved up to second place, displacing Harvard University to fourth. The Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) climbed two places to secure third place. The University of Cambridge slipped to fifth, having shared third place with MIT in the previous year.
Notably, Italy’s Catholic University of the Sacred Heart made a significant debut, entering the rankings in the 301-350 bracket. The majority of new entrants this year are from Asia.
The United States boasts the highest representation in the rankings, with 169 institutions, and is particularly dominant in the top 200, where it has 56 institutions. India is now the fourth most-represented nation, with 91 institutions, surpassing China, which has 86.
Four European countries, including Kosovo, Bosnia and Herzegovina, North Macedonia, and Armenia, entered the rankings for the first time this year. This contrasts with the previous year, when all new entrants were from Africa.
Regarding individual performance indicators, Stanford University leads in the teaching category, while the University of Oxford and the University of Cambridge excel in the research environment category. In the research quality category (formerly known as the citations category), MIT takes the top spot. The University of Sharjah in the United Arab Emirates garners the highest score for international outlook, while 28 institutions earn a perfect score of 100 for the industry engagement pillar.
In addition to the 1,904 ranked institutions, there are 769 universities listed with “reporter” status, signifying that they provided data but did not meet eligibility criteria for ranking. These institutions have agreed to be displayed as reporters in the final table.
