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Best universities in Australia 2024

Find the best universities in australia with times higher education ’s world university rankings 2024 data.

Top 10 universities in Australia 2024

Scroll down for the full list of best universities in Australia

If you are looking to study in Australia, you will need to know which are the top universities in Australia. 

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There are 37 top universities in Australia, according to  Times Higher Education ’s World University Rankings 2024 , and six of them feature in the prestigious top 100, meaning there is no shortage of choice.

The best Australian universities are spread across the country, from Perth in the west to Brisbane in the east, Darwin in the north and Hobart in the south.

Best universities in the United States Best universities in Asia Best universities in South America Best universities in the UK  Best universities in Europe Best universities in India

The best university in Australia, according to the THE  rankings, is the University of Melbourne .

Australia has the third-highest number of international students in the world, behind only the UK and the US – pretty impressive for a nation of just 25 million people.

Top 5 universities in Australia

5. the university of queensland.

The University of Queensland  has about 40,000 students enrolled, including 12,000 international students from 141 countries.

It also has one of Australia’s largest PhD cohorts, with about 13,800 postgraduate students registered.

Famous graduates include a Nobel laureate, two Fortune 500 company CEOs, Oscar winner Geoffrey Rush and poet Bronwyn Lea.

The university’s main campus is located in the green and leafy inner Brisbane suburb of St Lucia – one of the most affluent areas of the city. There are two other campuses as part of the university and 40 teaching and research sites.

About a third of the students come from overseas, from more than 142 countries.

4. Australian National University

The Australian National University was established in 1946. It is located in Canberra, Australia’s capital city and seat of government.

The university was originally created as a postgraduate research university by the Parliament of Australia.

It counts six Nobel prizewinners among its faculty and alumni, and is even run by a Nobel laureate. Brian Schmidt – who won the 2011 Nobel Prize in Physics (with Saul Perlmutter and Adam Riess) for providing evidence that the expansion of the universe is accelerating – is the institution’s vice-chancellor.

ANU has many partnerships with international universities, including National University of Singapore .

3. University of Sydney

Founded in 1851, the University of Sydney is the oldest university in Australia.

Approximately 46,000 students attend the University of Sydney , representing some 134 nations.

The are more than 280 overseas exchange programmes in place with more than 30 countries.

No fewer than five Australian prime ministers attended the university, including Edmund Barton who, in 1901, won Australia’s first ever federal election.

There are more than 90 research centres at the university undertaking globally recognised research in a range of areas.

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2.  Monash University

Monash University was founded in 1958 and is the largest university in Australia.

Famous alumni include musician Nick Cave, Booker Prize-winning novelist Peter Carey and playwright David Williamson.

The university was named after the engineer, military leader and public administrator Sir John Monash.

Students can choose from more than 6,000 courses across 10 faculties: art, design and architecture; arts; business and economics; education; engineering; information technology; law; medicine, nursing and health sciences; pharmacy and pharmaceutical sciences; and science.

The university has many campuses across Victoria and Australia, as well as international campuses in Malaysia, Italy, India and China. It operates several libraries at all its campuses, housing more than 3.2 million items in total.

1. University of Melbourne

The University of Melbourne was founded in 1853, making it the second-oldest university in the country. Nobel prizewinner Peter Doherty (physiology and medicine) and fellows of the Royal Society David Solomon and David Boger all teach or research at Melbourne.

It is home to 47,000 students and 6,500 members of staff, and has 280,000 alumni around the world (some 15 per cent of whom live outside Australia).

More than 12,000 international students are enrolled at the University of Melbourne  and, if you do get a place there, you will be joining students from 130 countries.

Top universities in Australia 2024

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Times Higher Education World University Rankings 2024

Below are the top universities according to the Times Higher Education World University Rankings 2024 . The THE World University Rankings critique institutions according to 13 key performance indicators including learning environment, research influence and international outlook.

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Measuring the long game in education.

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If the ultimate goal of education is to prepare students for successful futures after they leave our ... [+] schools, we should prioritize those long-term outcomes.

With graduation season in full swing, many students and their families are deservedly celebrating a major milestone. Successfully completing high school or college is a great accomplishment; but when “Pomp and Circumstance” fades into the background and the graduation parties are over, how do we know whether education has actually provided students with what they need for their futures?

The true marker of success in education shouldn’t be the graduation cap; it’s what happens after the tassel is turned.

Traditionally, our measures of educational outcomes have been pretty basic and not directly related to how graduates are using their education to improve their lives and their livelihood beyond school. Success has largely been measured by the number of students who graduate from high school or a postsecondary program, along with test scores designed to assess their knowledge and skills at a given point in time. These things are undoubtedly important, but graduation rates and test scores alone do not tell the full story of whether education is equipping students with the knowledge and skills necessary to build well-paying careers and actively contribute to their communities.

It’s time to think differently about how we measure success in our education systems—both K-12 and higher education. If the ultimate goal of education is to prepare students for successful futures after they leave our schools, we should prioritize those long-term outcomes.

A new report from Education Strategy Group and American Student AssistanceⓇ examines how all 50 states are approaching the complexities of measuring long-term success in both K-12 and higher education. Though many states are making good faith efforts to capture data to better understand how education impacts students in the next phase of their lives, the report finds that too few are currently attaching meaningful incentives to reward schools and colleges for improving students’ postsecondary and workforce success.

More specifically, at the K-12 level, while many states now include college and career readiness metrics in their performance goals for high schools, just eight states extend their models to include measures of how high school graduates ultimately do after they graduate and get to college and the workforce. In higher education, only six states use measures of how students do in the workforce after leaving postsecondary institutions to inform funding decisions.

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If we want to ensure that K-12 graduates do well in college and careers, and that college graduates, in turn, do well in the labor market, leaders at all levels of the education system need better, timelier and more detailed information about those outcomes. That information also needs to be attached to real incentives—including serving as part of funding and accountability models—to drive change. Leaders can only make changes to improve outcomes if they first have an understanding of what those outcomes are; otherwise, they are flying blind.

Part of the challenge in doing this well lies in the historical siloes that exist between K-12 education, higher education and the workforce. Each sector has developed its own measures and data systems over time, making it difficult to connect them and track a student’s progress and outcomes over time and across sectors.

Fortunately, a few states are leading the way in demonstrating what it looks like to build the infrastructure needed to understand long-term outcomes. Kentucky’s KYSTATS database sets a gold standard for data systems by collecting and integrating education and workforce data to offer policymakers and the public a more complete picture of how the systems connect to one another. This resource is a one-stop shop for understanding how the education to workforce continuum in Kentucky—from K-12 to postsecondary to employment—is serving Kentuckians. As an early leader in this work, Kentucky has offered a blueprint for other states to emulate in building their own systems to understand long-term outcomes.

With better systems in place, more states can and should hold themselves, their schools and their colleges accountable for the outcomes that matter the most for students’ long-term economic well being. Though there is a long way to go, a select few states are stepping up in meaningful ways.

Vermont is the only state to include employment outcomes in its federal K-12 school accountability system. The state’s Post-Secondary Outcomes indicator measures the percentage of graduates who enroll in college or trade school, enlist in the military or work full time in a job. By attaching this measure to formal accountability, Vermont plans to hold K-12 schools partially responsible for setting students up for long-term success.

On the financial side, Texas is leading the way by providing incentive funding to both K-12 districts and higher education institutions attached to the long-term measures that matter most. For K-12 districts, the state funds a College, Career and Military Readiness Outcomes Bonus by which districts can earn bonus funding when they increase the number of high school students who enroll in higher education or complete an industry-recognized credential. Similarly, the state’s new outcomes-based funding model for community colleges provides funding based on the number of learners who earn credentials of value rather than the traditional approach of funding colleges based on the number of students enrolled in classes.

These changes in performance goals and funding levers are making a difference with schools. The financial bonuses for Texas high schools have driven higher participation rates in the college and career readiness offerings, and although it’s early, the new funding formula for community colleges is shifting the emphasis toward credential attainment and readiness for careers.

Long-term outcome measures aren’t only important for driving the performance of education institutions. This information needs to be shared with students and their families so that they can make informed choices about which options to pursue.

Some of the states with the best information are taking steps to use it to empower consumers, particularly when it comes to making informed choices about higher education.

Kentucky’s Students’ Right to Know dashboard , which is powered by KYSTATS, is a student-facing tool that allows users to see job projections, salary information and where programs are offered for different majors. Even more impressively, Kentucky and its neighbors in Ohio, Indiana and Tennessee are addressing the challenge of gathering wage data for college graduates who move out of state by linking data in what they are calling a Multi-State Postsecondary Report .

Colorado, too, is helping students and institutions to understand the potential return on investment in higher education. Students can use the earnings outcomes dashboard to make informed decisions based on projected earnings by institution and major. The state also produces an annual return on investment report and is working to develop a “minimum value threshold” to ensure that institutions are only offering programs that will pay off for students.

While data and measurement might not be the flashiest topics in the education debate, they are among the most foundational. Centering long-term outcomes as core drivers of our educational priorities will help expand economic mobility for all. We need to think differently about success—and do a better job of measuring it—to improve outcomes for every student.

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Education Department vows 'full-scale review' of financial aid office after FAFSA debacle

The Education Department said Thursday that it is taking steps to improve operations at its Federal Student Aid office after months of delays and errors with this year’s overhauled Free Application for Federal Student Aid. The form, known as FAFSA, had a botched rollout, disrupting decision timelines for current and prospective college students and schools across the country.

In a letter to staff members Thursday, Secretary Miguel Cardona said the agency was conducting a “full-scale review of FSA’s current and historical organization, management, staffing, workflow structures, business processes, and operations,” as well as vendor contracts.

In addition, the department is shaking up the office’s leadership and bringing on a team of information technology experts to help with FAFSA next year, among other efforts.

“For half a century, Federal Student Aid (FSA) has helped millions of Americans access higher education,” Cardona wrote. “Today, FSA maintains the same mission. But like any organization, its methods and scope of work have changed dramatically over time, and the environment where it now operates is continuously evolving.”

The Education Department has hired the Boston Consulting Group to recommend ways to improve the FSA office, an agency spokesperson told NBC News. It is also working to improve oversight and accountability, Cardona said in his letter, adding that “transformational changes” at the office will be “informed by input from students, educators, and experts in systems design.”

The agency has tapped Denise Carter, the acting assistant secretary for finance and operations, to lead FSA in the interim as it searches for a new executive after Richard Cordray announced his departure in late April. He is set to stay on through early July, the spokesperson said.

Cardona said the agency welcomes guidance from the Office of the Inspector General and lawmakers, many of whom have pressed the department in recent months over its flawed overhaul of FAFSA, which Congress ordered in 2022.

Federal Student Aid has processed all of the 10.3 million FAFSA forms that had been submitted as Wednesday, the Education Department spokesperson said. After having cleared its backlog in recent weeks, officials have smoothed out a process that pushed schools to delay financial aid offers, sometimes by months, and left students making tough decisions about their futures .

FAFSA completions were down only 15.5% as of May 17, according to the National College Attainment Network, a significant improvement from an almost 40% drop in March. (The Education Department spokesperson said completions are only about 11% lower.)

“As we implement these changes at FSA, we remain committed to ensuring its core functions continue,” Cardona said in his letter. “We are working tirelessly to help all students have access to the resources they need to attain higher education.”

Haley Messenger is a producer at NBC News covering business and the economy.

Moscow State Medical University Sechenov to open in Sri Lanka

T he first Moscow State Medical University Sechenov, with a history dating back to nearly 150 years, is looking at investing in the higher education sector in Sri Lanka.

A special meeting and discussion in this took place last Saturday, at the Russian Cultural Centre where a high-profile Academic delegation from the University participated and it was followed up with a second meeting with the Minister of Education and Health along with senior officials of the Medical Council.

A senior member of the delegation Prof. Petr Glybochko, Rector of Sechenov from First Moscow State Medical University, Academician of Russian Academy of Medical Science and a Doctor of Medical Science, Andrey Svistunov-First Vice-Rector of the University, Dmitry Klyuev, Head of LegalDepartment and Elena Shustikova , Director’s Assistant of the clinical center from the University have indicated that they are keen to take over and operate a abandoned medical facility with accommodation facilities in Sri Lanka preferably in the western province.

The mentor behind this project, former Ambassador to Russia Dr. Saman Weerasinghe said that the both countries maintain very cordial relationships for several decades and Russian counterparts are also very happy with the current economic status of Sri Lanka.

They have alsoindicated that they could also be able to attract foreign students and thereby get FOREX to Sri Lanka. “In addition Sri Lanka can also save FOREX as the local students could study at this proposed university.”

The visiting delegation also met parents of students who are already studying in Russia and parents of students of those who are planning to study in Russian and students who are seeking to pursue their higher education in Russia.

First Secretary of the Russian Embassy Maria Popova, and Director of the Russian House in Colombo, Buddhapriya Ramanayake also said that for thefirst the Russian centre will introduce a special familiarization program for students going to Russia for higher education.