By Ruth A Pagell*
(28 Apr 2026) The previous article asked four questions, none of which were completely answered
- What else is new at THE?
- What changes has CWTS Leiden made?
- Do the Human Freedom rankings affect university rankings?
- What is the number one university in the world?
I thought I had finished updating THE, but they released a new ranking in conjunction with Statistica that will be covered at a later date. One focus of this article is the changes to CWTS Leiden. VDEM released its Academic Freedom Rankings, which has taken the spotlight off of who is number one. Both of these topics cover the fall of U.S. academia. They provide me with information that supports my answer to the final question. I also revisited the rankings recognized by IREG ( Inventory of International Rankings). I checked each ranking to see if there is a consensus of who is number one and is number one the same for all users. There are also new initiatives using open source data or just asking AI (1). I will begin with an in depth examination of the latest CWTS Leiden rankings. As I worked myself through the rankings, the 2026 Academic Freedom results were released AFI is the second topic on my agenda.
CWTS LEIDEN RANKINGS 2025
I find the CWTS Leiden’s updated rankings the most interesting for researchers. It focuses exclusively on bibliometric data. It offers CWTS Leiden Traditional Ranking and CWTS Leiden OpenAlex Ranking. Publications in Web of Science are the basis for Leiden’s Traditional Ranking. There are two OpenAlex options. One uses core publications identified as international scientific journals ranking. The other option includes publications in scientific journals with a national or regional focus. Rankings are based on the number of publications, number of publications in the top percent of their fields, and the percent of publications in the top percent, such as top10 percent based on citations. Ranking on citations is a rank by quality. The number of universities increased from 1506 in 2024 to 1594 in 2025. Below are three tables with differing results based on the different data sets.
Leiden Traditional -Example 1: Web of Science publications
| 1594 Universities | World Rank by total output | Total Output: Total # of articles | Output: # in top 10% | Rank: Citations: # in top 10%
|
Percent in top 10% | Rank: Percent in top 10% citations
|
| Zhejiang | 1 | 40492 | 5228 | 2 | 12.9 | 180 |
| Harvard | 3 | 36163 | 7003 | 1 | 19.4 | 4 |
| MIT | 105 | 9905 | 2216 | 30 | 22.4% | 1 |
Nine of the top 10 based on quantity are Chinese. Eight of the top ten for the number of publications in the top 10 are Chinese. None of the top ten in percent of publication are in the top 10 percent, with five from the U.S, two from the UK, and on each from Israel, Singapore, and Saudi Arabia.
Ruth’s Rankings 59 introduced CWTS Leiden’s Open Edition using OpenAlex data that increased from 1506 universities in the first version to 2773 in the current edition.
Leiden Open – Example 2: Core Publications from Open Alex
| 2773 Universities | World Rank by output | Number of Total Output articles | Number in top 10% | Rank on # in top 10% citations | Percent in
top 10% |
Rank in # in top 10% citations
|
| Harvard | 1 | 40475 | 7770 | 1 | ||
| Zhejiang | 2 | 35974 | 5384 | 2 | 15% | 109 |
| Rockefeller | 2014 | 775 | 775 | 223 | 28.8 % | 1 |
Eight of the top 10 based on quantity for total output and top ten percent are Chinese, one U.S. and one from Canada
Leiden Open – Example 3: The 2025 rankings introduced a new indicator, OpenAlex including scientific journals with a national or regional focus.
| 2831 Universities | World Rank by output | Total Output | Number in top 10% | Rank on # in top 10% citations | Percent in
top 10% |
Rank
|
| Harvard | 1 | 43503 | 14874 | 1 | 34.2 | 54 |
| Zhejiang | 3 | 38954 | 13063 | 2 | 15% | 109 |
| Rockefeller | 2559 | 817 | 433 | 1067 | 53% | 1 |
Six of the top ten are from China and one each from U.S., Viet Nam, India, and the U.K. Adding the non-core publications is a step toward including more under-represented countries. The most additional publication are from Asia.
The CWTS Leiden rankings are for serious researchers who want to determine what institution is number one based on raw data. Read the “information” section and download the entire dataset with additional metrics. (https://open.leidenranking.com/information/indicators).
CWTS Leiden resources:
Leiden Traditional: https://traditional.leidenranking.com/
Leiden Open: https://open.leidenranking.com/
RR ( 27 Mar. 2024 ).Ruth’s Rankings 59: CWTS Leiden introduces OpenAlex to its rankings: Is this the start of a new era of ranking bibliometrics? https://librarylearningspace.com/ruths-ranking-59-cwts-leiden-introduces-openalex-to-its-rankings-is-this-the-start-of-a-new-era-of-rankings-bibliometrics/
Van Eck, M.J.. Costas, R. ,Neoksse;. M.et.al (29 Oct 2025 ). The CWTS Leiden Ranking 2025 – More open, more inclusive, more informative. https://www.leidenmadtrics.nl/articles/the-cwts-leiden-ranking-2025-more-open-more-inclusive-more-informative
OTHER IREG UNIVERSITY RANKINGS
There are many other world rankings, some affiliated with regional organizations, such as National Taiwan University’s Performance Rankings of Scientific Papers…. New rankings are appearing, using open data. It is difficult to evaluate the quality of the new rankings since details on methodology are not available. LSE (London School of Economics and Politics) recently published an article on predatory rankings misusing Webometrics (Moskovkin).
Harvard remains number one in most rankings based on output. The rankings below show an increase by output of Chinese universities. Most academics, students, and researchers are not going to be applying to the top 10 percent of institutions. U.S. universities with the lowest acceptance rates are mostly private, accepting less that 10% of students who apply.Acceptance rates for U. S. universities are in U.S. News Best Colleges rankings.
See APPENDIX 1 for notes and connections to the above rankings.
How should quality be measured? Number of articles, number of citations, number of highly cited articles, number of citations per faculty? Doing a search of Web of Science, using the Leiden time frame of 2020-2023, Harvard is number one in publications with the University of Chinese Academy of Sciences(UCAS) second. Based on topics? UCAS and Indian Institute of Technology were tops in Engineering with no U.S university in the top 20. The U.S. is stronger in biomedical topics with Harvard tops in the bio-medical field.
We are all curious to see who is number one. However, the majority of people using the rankings for personal decision making will not be applying to the top institutions. For example, the acceptance rate is fewer than 10% of students applying to top universities in the U.S. Rather than being concerned with the U.S. no longer dominating the lop lists, I am excited to see more players. I am concerned about the quality of articles from Chinese universities. I am not the only one. See articles by Grove and Mosheim that question the quality of Chinese output.
Nature index has a supplement on the future of Chinese research. One article specifically asks if China can keep up its extraordinary growth https://www.nature.com/collections/jajheedahd
Baker, S. (25 Mar 2026). Can China keep up its extraordinary research growth? Nature Index. https://www.nature.com/collections/jajheedahd
Grove, J. (6 Jan 2026). China ‘marked down’ in scholar’s retraction-adjusted rankings. Times Higher Education News. https://www.timeshighereducation.com/news/china-marked-down-scholars-retraction-adjusted-rankings
Mosheim, T. (23 Mar 2026). ‘Quality has to catch up with quantity’ in China’s HE expansion. Times Higher Education. https://www.timeshighereducation.com/news/quality-has-catch-quantity-chinas-he-expansion
RR Feb 2026. https://librarylearningspace.com/ruths-rankings-end-of-the-year-review/
PART 2: ACADEMIC FREEDOM
Universities are more than the numbers of articles they publish or students they graduate. They are part of the socio-economic systems of their countries. Ruth’s Rankings expanded the scope of university rankings by introducing econometric and social indicators in 2016 (RR 21) This was followed in 2021 by RR 48 Part 2 https://librarylearningspace.com/ruths-rankings-48-part-2-country-and-company-environmental-rankings-add-new-sets-of-indicators-to-our-vocabulary/ and https://librarylearningspace.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/01/APPENDIX-48-2-B-Social-Indicators-Clive-edit.pdf.
(1 Mar 2023) Ruth’s Rankings 54: https://librarylearningspace.com/ruths-rankings-54-academic-freedom-and-its-relationship-to-university-rankings/ademic freedom and its relationship to university rankings
2026 began with focus on Chinese universities publishing more articles than Harvard university. As we can see from the data in CWTS Leiden, it depended on which group of articles were selected. I was waiting for VDem to issue its Academic Freedom index, with interest in how far the U.S. would fall. The fact that China has always been in the bottom five percent in academic freedom does not seem to matter. But it matters to me.
| COUNTRIES RANKED BY Publications | Country | V-Dem Academic Freedom Rank | Human Freedom Rank | Reporters without Borders | Freedom House | Population Rank | Income |
| 1 | China * | 171 | 149 | 178 | 9 | 2 | 77 |
| 2 | United States | 136 | 15 | 57 | 81 | 3 | 12 |
| 3 | India | 157 | 110 | 151 | 62 | 1 | 121 |
| 4 | United Kingdom* | 82 | 19 | 20 | 92 | 22 | 34 |
| 5 | Germany | 22 | 17 | 11 | 74 | 19 | 22 |
| 6 | Italy | 52 | 31 | 49 | 87 | 25 | 33 |
| 7 | Japan | 62 | 19 | 66 | 96 | 12 | 44 |
| 8 | Canada | 33 | 12 | 21 | 97 | 38 | 30 |
| 9 | Spain | 26 | 28 | 23 | 91 | 32 | 36 |
CONCLUSION
The purpose of this article has been to identify the number one university in the world, against the background of the battle between Harvard and Chinese universities. My conclusion is that universities are multi-dimensional, publishing the most articles (depending on who is counting) does not make university number one. Access to top universities are of course limited. 90 percent of students based on acceptance to US universities where data is available will never qualify for a top university. The only conclusion is that based on data from the 2025 CWT Leiden Traditional edition is that the Chinese have the most publications, led by Zhejiang. We know rankings are flawed. Multidimensional rankings, even with their issues, may aid in identifying universities subject areas, job placement, student cities, U.S. acceptance rates. Academic Freedom should not be ignored,
Reporters w/o borders: https://rsf.org/en/index
https://freedomhouse.org/country/scores
Academic Freedom Index (V-Dem) https://academic-freedom-index.net/research/Academic_Freedom_Index_Update_2026.pdf
Q: Should university rankings “turn a blind eye to varying levers of academic freedom?” (Kinzelbach, Saliba, & Spannagel)
** WOS lists the four countries of the United Kingdom separately.
https://www.cato.org/human-freedom-index/2025
Population: https://population.un.org/wpp/
https://data.worldbank.org/indicator/NY.GDP.PCAP.PP.CD?most_recent_value_desc=true
GDP per capita, PPP (current international $)
APPENDIX 1: URLS for rankings
NOTE: Note – Some rankings, including the Chinese ARWU do not include the University of the Chinese Academy of Sciences in university rankings.
From February Ruth’s Rankings (https://librarylearningspace.com/ruths-rankings-end-of-the-year-review/)
ARWU: https://www.shanghairanking.com/rankings/arwu/2025
QS https://www.topuniversities.com/university-rankings 2026 (2023)
THE https://www.timeshighereducation.com/world-university-rankings/latest/world-ranking 2026 (2011)
U.S. NEWS BEST GLOBAL UNIVERSITIES https://www.usnews.com/education/best-global-universities/search (current year only)
Leiden Traditional: https://traditional.leidenranking.com/
Leiden Open: https://open.leidenranking.com/
NTU Rankings (1)– National Taiwan Universities – Performance Rankings of Scientific Papers for World Universities; only bibliometrics: Clarivate data http://nturanking.csti.tw/ranking/OverallRanking/
CWUR: Global 2000 List The center for world university rankings: using articles from a selected list of journals; includes am employability metric https://cwur.org/2025.php
URAP: University Ranking by academic performance; Data from Web Of Science, Scopus, and Google scholar; The goal of the URAP ranking system is to “help universities identify potential areas of progress with respect to specific academic performance indicators. “; https://urapcenter.org/Rankings/2024-2025/World_Ranking_2024-2025
RUR Round University Ranking (Georgia) https://roundranking.com/. Uses The Lens for bibliometrics; includes an indicator for financial sustainability (https://www.lens.org/).
Scimago Institutions Rankings: https://www.scimagoir.com/ Scimago is unique in that it covers a variety of sectors, including companies. Over 10,000 universities are ranked. https://www.scimagoir.com/rankings.php?sector=Higher%20educ. Scimago Methodology includes three factors, research, societal which includes media mentions, and innovation, including patents : https://www.scimagoir.com/methodology.php
NATURE INDEX: uses 145 Nature journals excluding social sciences and humanities. It has a special section on Chinese rankings. https://www.nature.com/collections/jajheedahd
https://www.nature.com/nature-index/institution-outputs/generate/all/global/academic
https://www.nature.com/nature-index/institution-outputs/generate/all/global/all
URLs for Ruth’s Rankings articles on Academic Freedom
Ruth’s Rankings 21 (2016): Flagship Universities in Asia: From Bibliometrics to Econometrics and Social Indicators: https://librarylearningspace.com/ruths-rankings-21-flagship-universities-asia-bibliometrics-econometrics-social-indicators/
Ruth’s Rankings 48 Part 2 (2021): Country and Company Environmental Rankings add new sets of Indicators to our Vocabulary: https://librarylearningspace.com/ruths-rankings-48-part-2-country-and-company-environmental-rankings-add-new-sets-of-indicators-to-our-vocabulary
Ruth’s Rankings 54 (Mar 2023): Academic freedom and its relationship to university rankings: https://librarylearningspace.com/ruths-rankings-54-academic-freedom-and-its-relationship-to-university-rankings/
Ruth’s Rankings 54 – Addendum: Update to Academic Freedom and QS Sustainability Rankings(Dec 202: https://librarylearningspace.com/tag/qs-world-university-rankings-sustainability/
https://support.qs.com/hc/en-gb/articles/8551842433308-Impact-of-Education
*Ruth A. Pagell is emeritus faculty librarian at Emory University. After working at Emory, she was the founding librarian of the Li Ka Shing Library at Singapore Management University and then adjunct faculty [teaching] in the Library and Information Science Program at the University of Hawaii. She has written and spoken extensively on various aspects of librarianship, including contributing articles to ACCESS – https://orcid.org/0000-0003-3238-9674
