How New Zealand universities fare in the latest QS rankings

The 2025 edition of the QS World University Rankings has highlighted both strengths and areas for improvement for New Zealand’s universities on the global stage.

UNIVERSITY WORLD RANKINGS	2025	2024	Change
University of Auckland	65	68	+3
University of Otago	214	206	-8
University of Waikato	235	250	+15
Massey University	239	239	0
Te Herenga Waka Victoria University of Wellington	244	241	-3
University of Canterbury	261	256	-5
Lincoln University	371	362	-9
Auckland University of Technology	412	407	-5

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The rankings reveal that overall, New Zealand universities are performing well in important areas like sustainability and social justice. There has also been growth in research impact with most New Zealand universities climbing in the number of citations per faculty.

Good news also as New Zealand universities continue to attract diverse international faculty, with six of the eight ranked institutions placing in the top 100 worldwide for the International Faculty Ratio.

The 2025 rankings suggest that there are challenges for New Zealand universities around graduate employability. Rankings dropped for all eight universities for both Employer Reputation and the newly introduced Employment Outcomes metric, underscoring the importance of strengthening industry partnerships and strategies to prepare work-ready graduates.

Overall, both the University of Auckland and the University of Waikato rose in the 2025 rankings, while five slightly declined, and one held steady. The University of Auckland remains the country's top-ranked institution at 65th.

The latest QS World University Rankings include 1,500 institutions across 106 locations.

Read the full global QS rankings here.

For more information contact comms@universitiesnz.ac.nz or +64 27 636 5050.