The Hardman Rankings

How it scores

Research
98
Alumni outcomes
95
Admissions & earnings
12/91

Research and Alumni outcomes are percentiles among 2,287 universities; alumni outcomes are counted per student. Admissions & earnings is the position among universities in the same country (United Kingdom).

Admissions, outcomes and alumni

Offer rate (UK 18-year-olds, UCAS)
51.1% src
Offer holders who enrol
21% src
Median earnings 5 years after graduating (LEO)
£37,600 src
Internationally notable alumni (Wikidata)
65 src
Heads of state or government (Wikidata)
13 src
Founders, billionaires and $30M+ alumni
not on the published top lists; estimated
Students (undergraduate / total)
25,790 / 39,015 src

Each figure links to its source. Admissions and earnings figures are comparable only within a country.

Research Index

A · Quality
93.7
B · Strength
93.3

Percentiles among 1,305 ranked universities. Rank on quality alone: =72. On strength alone: =88. The Research Index scores research only; admissions, earnings and alumni outcomes are scored in the overall ranking where data exists.

The numbers behind it (2020–2023)

Papers in the top 10% of their field
14.7% (14.2%–15.2%)
Papers in the top 1% of their field
1.8% (1.7%–2.0%)
Top-10% papers (fractional count)
1,614
All papers (fractional count)
10,977
International co-authored
65.2%
Open access
88.3%
Papers from 2020–23 since retracted
15 (0.45 per 1,000)

Core publications, fractional counting, field-normalised citation shares. Brackets show Leiden’s stability interval. Collaboration and open-access shares use full counting and aren’t field-normalised. Retraction counts come from the Retraction Watch database and include publishers’ mass retractions as well as honest-error retractions; a retraction is not by itself evidence of misconduct, and the count is never scored.

By field

Biomedical & health sciences16range 11–24 of 1,671
Life & earth sciences=56range 39–98 of 1,092
Mathematics & computer science=92range 62–185 of 1,391
Physical sciences & engineering=112range 83–156 of 1,742
Social sciences & humanities=149range 90–274 of 1,262

Position over time

top 3%top 10%2006–2009: 46 of 5712020–2023: 48 of 1,305

The same method applied to each 4-year publication window. The number of ranked universities grows from period to period, so position is shown as a share of the field.

How other rankings place it

48Research Index 2026
35QS 2027
=29THE 2027
38ARWU 2026

Other rankings are cited for comparison. The Research Index measures research only; QS and THE also use reputation surveys and figures universities submit, and ARWU counts prize winners and total output.

Prize winners

Alumni laureates
11
Staff laureates
15

Alumni: 10 Nobel, 1 Turing Award. Most recent: Geoffrey Hinton (Nobel Physics, 2024), Geoffrey Hinton (Turing Award, 2018), Richard Henderson (Nobel Chemistry, 2017), Fraser Stoddart (Nobel Chemistry, 2016), May-Britt Moser (Nobel Medicine, 2014), Randy Schekman (Nobel Medicine, 2013). Counted from Wikidata (CC0). Alumni laureates count toward the overall ranking per student (10 of 65 global weight points); staff laureates are shown for context only.