Universities in Saudi Arabia claimed 16 spots on a world university ranking index by the globally renowned Quacquarelli Symonds (GS) for the year 2023, the official Saudi Press Agency reported on Thursday.
The latest rating saw two more universities in the Kingdom join the list compared to 2022, and seven more compared to 2019.
King Abdulaziz University (KAU) topped the list at 106th out of nearly 1,500 universities worldwide.
“With this new progress, the Kingdom is six places away to be included in the top 100 international universities list,” SPA reported.
KAU is followed by King Fahd University of Petroleum and Minerals and King Saud University in the QS ranking. Al-Faisal and Northern Border Universities also entered the rankings for the first time in the 2023 list.
“The QS classification evaluates universities per several criteria, mainly the university’s reputation, which is calculated in the largest survey of academic opinions around the world, by sending it to more than 130,000 experts,” according to SPA.
For 2023, the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) in US, the University of Cambridge in UK, and Stanford University in the US claimed the top three spots.
Saudi Arabia ranked first in the Arab world and 25th globally in the field of scientific publishing, SPA previously reported in April, citing the Scimago Index.
Saudi universities have reportedly contributed 93 percent of the national output of scientific research.
