How can you measure reputation?

No rankings methodology is perfect, and QS is no exception. In practice its reputation data comes from two distinct sources: academics and employers.

Academic Reputation is fundamentally how other academics view a university. QS takes some sensible measures to make sure that this is calculated as fairly as possible. Academics can’t vote for their own university – although in experiments academics do seem to be fairly realistic about the strength or weakness of the university they work for.

International reputation – votes that come from outside of a university’s home country – have more value than those from within. And academics are asked to vote based on their own area of expertise, allowing QS to explore reputation at a subject level as well as an overall level. The result is a coherent measure of academic reputation that looks sensible to an outsider.

In the 2027 ranking, Harvard again leads on academic reputation. This may surprise those who have followed its recent difficulties with government intervention and institutional controversy. But this speaks both to the depth of research that the university it undertakes and the professionalism of its leadership and communications teams. The academic community, it appears, takes a longer view than the news cycle.

Employer Reputation works differently to academic reputation – reflecting graduate performance and corporate relationships rather than research standing. Despite this, the two measures are strongly correlated – they track closely together.

A strong correlation does not mean that scores are identical. In fact, there are significant differences for some universities where they are stronger in either Academic Reputation, or in Employer Reputation.

Both reputation scores should be read with care. A strong Employer Reputation cannot guarantee individual graduate outcomes, and an overall university score can mask significant differences within individual subjects – every university has areas of strength and of weakness.

The data from the United Kingdom has some good news for those who see a prime role for universities to deliver job-ready graduates – thirty of the 93 ranked UK universities improved their employer reputation ranks, with an average gain of nearly ten places. But it also gives us an opportunity to explore situations where Academic and Employer Reputation do not match as closely.

The London School of Economics and Political Science (LSE) is a clear example. Its Employer Reputation score (99.7) comfortably exceeds its Academic Reputation (81.3), reflecting its long history of placing graduates into finance and consultancy, and the obvious advantage of sitting at the centre of one of the world’s great jobs markets.

Other universities cannot rely on geography in the same way. Sandison is clear about the approach needed at the University of Glasgow:

“Our global standing is earned through sustained academic excellence, with reputation treated as a strategic asset, which is enhanced through the articulation of a clear and compelling brand proposition and strengthened through proactive stewardship and action.”

Glasgow – for better or worse – is not London. But Sandison is clear that location is still a key part of their message. “World-Changing Glasgow is not a strapline – it is both a proof point and a promise that guides strategic intent.”

In other countries there are also interesting shifts. Indian universities are performing strongly in terms of employer reputation, while finding academic reputation more challenging. China, as we have come to expect, sees a continuation of its global rise with growth in both measures.

Beyond the focus on publications, talent has been another central pillar of China’s rise in the international education order.

Chinese universities, backed by national programmes, have pursued aggressive recruitment strategies to attract top researchers from abroad. Programmes such as the Thousand Talents Plan have been used to bring back overseas Chinese academics, says HKUST’s Zweig.

This has been backed by strong incentives. Returnees have been offered significantly higher salaries – in some cases double those of local faculty – plus better conditions, says Zweig. But the money comes with strings attached: greater demands in terms of publications, he adds.

The scale of the system has also helped. China is projected to produce more than 77,000 STEM PhDs a year, compared with about 40,000 in the US – giving China a deeper pool of researchers to sustain its research growth.

Meanwhile, the nation's top universities have continued to receive targeted funding for labs, facilities and faculty recruitment, according to Simon at the Quincy Institute. “China has actively recruited the best and the brightest,” he says, including overseas Chinese scientists and internationally trained researchers.

There are signs the strategy is working. Research by Yu Xie at Princeton Institute for International and Regional Studies and colleagues points to a steady rise in the number of scientists of Chinese descent returning from the US to China in recent years.

And as research funding pressures mount in the US under the Trump administration, that trend may continue, with more scientists returning to China.

Sustainability and reputation

The final place where reputation plays a part in the rankings – although in a more complex way – is as part of the sustainability metric. This now represents 5 percent of the overall score of a university, and we can see some interesting gaps. As with more traditional reputational measures, place plays a key role in sustainability.

This, the newest indicator in the QS World University Rankings, is taken from the standalone QS Sustainability Rankings. It too contains an element of reputation – both Employer Reputation and Academic Reputation from academics in relevant fields. Together these represent 13 percent of the score in the Sustainability Rankings, which equates to about 0.6 percent of the score in the World University Rankings.

Both the Sustainability Rankings and their inclusion in the World University Rankings are a brave new departure for QS. The Sustainability Rankings produce a very different list of universities, with Lund University from Sweden reaching the top spot (in comparison it ranks 71 in the World University Rankings).

It is also an area where there is more opportunity for universities to improve their scores year over year, and we see this when we look at the year-on-year changes in this metric. On average the academic reputation rank changed by 13 places, the sustainability rank changed by 45 places.

Of course, becoming a more sustainable university will support stronger reputational measures.

The 2027 rankings make it clear that reputation is not a single number. It is multi-dimensional and university specific. The differences in the way that the university is perceived – from academics, employers and the wider community – is critical, and the data from the rankings can give us a vital glimpse into this.