Methodologies

University rankings explained: THE, ARWU and QS for UTM

Cover Rankings

The University of Tunis El Manar (UTM) appears in several international rankings, and the results can look contradictory: the 101-200 band in one table and the 801-1000 band in another. The reason is that each ranking asks a different question. This article compares three well-known university rankings and explains why the Times Higher Education (THE) Sustainability Impact Ratings are a different kind of exercise. Results that come from the press are labelled with their source.

THE World University Rankings 2027

THE’s World University Rankings 2027 use 17 indicators grouped into five pillars: Teaching (29.5%), Research environment (29%), Research quality (30%), International outlook (7.5%) and Industry (4%). Reputation matters: teaching reputation is worth 15% and research reputation 18%. THE’s profile lists UTM in the 801-1000 band, and La Presse reports that UTM is the best-ranked Tunisian university in this edition.

ARWU (Shanghai Ranking)

The Academic Ranking of World Universities uses six indicators in its 2025 methodology: alumni winning Nobel Prizes and Fields Medals (10%), staff winning them (20%), Highly Cited Researchers (20%), articles in Nature and Science (20%), papers indexed in the Web of Science (20%) and a per capita performance score (10%). None of the six is a survey.

ShanghaiRanking’s page lists UTM in the 901-1000 band in 2024. According to Webdo, no Tunisian university appears in the ARWU 2026 general ranking: ARWU evaluates more than 2,500 universities but publishes only the top 1,000.

QS World University Rankings 2027

QS says its 2027 edition covers more than 1,500 universities across 106 higher education systems. According to La Presse, UTM is 655th, first in Tunisia and in the Maghreb, and 261st for Teaching and Employability and 289th for International Research Network. La Presse also reports that UTM placed in 14 subjects in the QS 2026 subject rankings and was first in Tunisia in all of them. QS’s indicator weights are not reproduced here: they are published on QS’s website.

Side by side

Ranking Built on UTM, as reported
THE World University Rankings 2027 17 indicators in five pillars, including reputation, research, teaching, international outlook and industry 801-1000 band (THE profile)
ARWU Six indicators on prizes, highly cited researchers and publications 901-1000 in 2024 (ShanghaiRanking); not in the published top 1,000 in 2026 (Webdo)
QS World University Rankings 2027 QS’s own indicators, with weights set by QS 655th (La Presse)
THE Sustainability Impact Ratings 2026 Evidence and research metrics for each SDG 101-200 band overall (THE profile)

Regional rankings add another view. According to Business News, UTM ranked 9th among 285 universities in the Arab Universities Union ranking 2025.

Why the Impact Ratings are different

The Impact Ratings do not measure overall academic strength. They assess a university’s contribution to the 17 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), and a university chooses which SDGs to submit. SDG 17 is compulsory for the overall table, which needs data on at least four SDGs. Any university that teaches at undergraduate or postgraduate level can take part, with no minimum research requirement, and many questions are scored on public evidence. Research metrics make up 27% of each SDG score.

In 2026 THE ranked 1,646 institutions from 116 countries and territories across 18 tables, and only universities that submit data appear. That is why a university can sit in the 101-200 band for impact and the 801-1000 band in the World University Rankings: the indicators differ, and so do the institutions being compared.

Reading rankings together

A sensible approach is to compare a university with itself, across years and indicators within the same ranking, rather than across rankings. For UTM’s impact results and how they are scored, read UTM first in Tunisia in the THE Sustainability Impact Ratings 2026 and How the THE Sustainability Impact Ratings 2026 work. The goal-by-goal activity behind the impact results is in the 2026 SDG reports.

Sources