UP slips in Asia rankings

MANILA, Philippines — The University of the Philippines retained its distinction as the top university in the country though it slid eight spots in the Asia rankings of the education think tank Quacquarelli Symonds (QS).

With an overall score of 60.6 points out of 100, UP placed 86th in the 2025 QS Asia University Rankings, from the 78th spot in the previous year.

A total of 984 Asian universities made it to the 2025 rankings, 25 of which were from the Philippines.

Aside from UP, the country’s three other leading universities also slipped in the rankings, with the Ateneo De Manila University at 142nd from 137th in the previous year, garnering a score of 49 points; De La Salle University at 163rd spot from 154th with 44.4 points and the University of Santo Tomas at 181st from 179th, with 42 points.

Meanwhile, five universities made it to the prestigious list for the first time, namely; West Visayas State University, Angeles University Foundation, University of Southeastern Philippines, University of Science and Technology of Southern Philippines and University of Southern Mindanao, which all landed in the 901+ spot.

Central Luzon State University, Central Mindanao University, Central Philippine University and Cebu Technological University, meanwhile, have re-entered the rankings after a couple of years’ absence. They were all at 851st-900th spot.

Other Philippine universities that made it to the 2025 rankings were Adamson University (411-420), University of San Carlos (481-490), Polytechnic University of the Philippines (541-560), Mapua University (561-580), Silliman University (601-620), Far Eastern University (681-700), Ateneo de Davao University (701-750), Mindanao State University-Iligan Institute of Technology (701-750), Saint Louis University (751-800), Lyceum of the Philippines University (801-850), Mindanao State University (801-850) and Xavier University (801-850).

Peking University in Beijing, China remained at the top of the overall rankings with a perfect score of 100, closely followed by the University of Hong Kong with a score of 99.7 and the National University of Singapore with 98.9.

Nanyang Technological University in Singapore came in fourth with a score of 98.3, followed by Fudan University in Shanghai, China with a score of 97. 2.

UP obtained its highest score in terms of employer reputation (94.4 points), followed by international research network (87.1) and academic reputation (83). It scored fairly in terms of faculty-to-student ratio with 47.9 points.