The 2025 QS World University Rankings, published in June 2024, assessed over 1,500 institutions worldwide using nine indicators. Within these results, the University of Hong Kong (HKU) climbed from 26th place in 2024 to 17th, the Chinese University of Hong Kong (CUHK) rose from 47th to 36th, and the Hong Kong University of Science and Technology (HKUST) moved from 60th to 47th. This once again gives Hong Kong three universities inside the global top 50. This article traces the shifting fortunes of these three institutions across five years of data, examining how their rankings and underlying metrics have evolved.
Five-year ranking trajectory: rotation, decline and a collective rebound
Using the annual QS ranking positions as markers, the global standings of HKU, CUHK and HKUST between 2021 and 2025 show a clear pattern of rotation. In the 2021 edition (actually released in 2020), HKU ranked 22nd, HKUST 27th and CUHK 43rd; at that time HKUST firmly held second place among Hong Kong institutions. In the 2022 edition, HKU remained at 22nd, HKUST slipped to 34th and CUHK rose to 39th, narrowing the gap between the two to just five places. By the 2023 edition, the order reversed for the first time: HKU advanced to 21st, CUHK climbed to 38th and HKUST fell to 40th, with CUHK reclaiming the position of Hong Kong’s second-highest-ranked university. In the 2024 edition, rankings for all three fell – HKU dropped to 26th, CUHK to 47th and HKUST to 60th, widening the gap between HKUST and CUHK to 13 places. The 2025 edition then saw a rebound: HKU, CUHK and HKUST landed at 17th, 36th and 47th respectively, putting all three back inside the top 50; the gap between HKUST and CUHK narrowed to 11 places, and no further rotation occurred.
This sequence shows that the pivotal rotation took place in the 2022–2023 cycle, when CUHK overtook HKUST by experiencing smaller rank declines and an earlier recovery. Meanwhile, HKU’s jump in the 2025 edition – a nine-place rise from the previous year – is the most eye-catching and represents the highest global ranking HKU has achieved in the QS tables since 2015.
Academic Reputation: a widening gap and HKU’s entrenched advantage
Academic Reputation, which carries a 40% weighting in the QS total score and is derived from a global survey of scholars, shows a five-year trend of a widening divide between HKU and the other two institutions. In the 2021 edition, HKU scored 97.7 (on a 100-point scale; the same scale applies below), CUHK 84.6 and HKUST 79.3. In 2022, HKU scored 97.6, CUHK 84.1 and HKUST 78.2. In 2023, the scores were HKU 97.4, CUHK 83.5 and HKUST 75.4. In 2024, they were HKU 97.4, CUHK 81.7 and HKUST 72.2. By the 2025 edition, HKU held at 98.4, CUHK rebounded to 84.9 and HKUST rose to 79.1. Even during the broader ranking pullback of 2024, HKU’s academic reputation showed little erosion, and its 2025 score nearly returned to its historical peak, underlining the resilience of its scholarly standing.
HKUST’s academic reputation fluctuated between 72.2 and 79.3 over the five years, with its 2024 low coinciding with the overall rank decline, before recovering by nearly seven points in 2025. CUHK’s reputation slid continuously from 84.1 to 81.7 between 2022 and 2024, signalling an erosion of research prestige in the surveys of that period, but it was significantly repaired in 2025. Measured from the 2021 baseline, HKU’s academic reputation has a net gain of 0.7 points over five years, CUHK a net gain of 0.3 points and HKUST a net loss of 0.2 points. HKU’s reputational moat has widened further.
Employer Reputation: convergence among the three, with HKUST barely clinging to a lead
Employer Reputation, weighted at 10% of the QS total and reflecting graduate employability and employer preferences, has been marked over the past five years by a convergence of scores and a steady overall uptrend. At the same time, HKUST’s relative advantage is eroding.
In the 2021 edition, HKUST’s employer reputation score was 73.1, HKU’s 70.2 and CUHK’s 65.4. In 2022, HKUST scored 70.9, HKU 71.6 and CUHK 67.3. In 2023 the figures were HKUST 71.2, HKU 73.5 and CUHK 69.0. In 2024 they were HKUST 70.3, HKU 76.1 and CUHK 71.2. By the 2025 edition, HKU recorded 76.3, CUHK 73.8 and HKUST only 72.1. Originally, HKUST – with its strengths in business and engineering – held a clear lead in employer surveys, but HKU overtook it for the first time in the 2022 edition and has stayed ahead every year since, leading by 4.2 points in 2025. Over five years, HKU’s employer reputation score has gained a net 6.1 points, CUHK has gained 8.4 points, and HKUST has lost 1.0 point. CUHK’s 8.4-point rise is the largest among the three and reflects the rapid expansion of its graduates’ employment networks across the Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macao Greater Bay Area in recent years. According to visa data from the Immigration Department (ImmD) under the Immigration Arrangements for Non-local Graduates (IANG) scheme, the total number of approved visas in 2023 rose by about 48% compared to 2019, underscoring the strong absorption of Hong Kong graduates by employers.
Citations per Faculty: CUHK soars while HKUST’s research engine stalls
Citations per Faculty, weighted at 20%, measures the citation impact of Scopus-indexed publications per academic staff member. The five-year trend in this dimension is closely tied to shifts in research funding within the Greater Bay Area.
In the 2021 edition, HKUST scored 66.4 on citations per faculty, HKU 52.5 and CUHK 47.8. In 2022: HKUST 61.3, HKU 55.9, CUHK 51.2. In 2023: HKUST 57.2, HKU 56.8, CUHK 55.4. In 2024: HKUST 51.7, HKU 54.8, CUHK 56.1. By the 2025 edition, CUHK rose to 62.2, HKU to 59.1 and HKUST fell back to 53.4. This is the first time CUHK has led the three institutions on this indicator, with a five-year increase of 14.4 points – the largest among them. In 2021–2022, HKUST’s citation advantage over HKU once exceeded 10 points, but its score then declined for three consecutive years; by 2025, it had shed 13 points from its peak.
This trajectory aligns with research funding data from the University Grants Committee (UGC). From the 2020/21 to 2023/24 academic years, CUHK’s share of approved General Research Fund (GRF) projects awarded by the Research Grants Council (RGC) rose from roughly 18% to around 21%, while HKUST’s share fell from approximately 23% to 19%. The changing capacity to attract research grants has indirectly influenced the output of highly cited papers. CUHK’s 2023–24 Annual Report notes that the number of its papers ranked among the world’s top 1% by citations over a five-year window increased by 31%, consistent with the rise in its Citations per Faculty score.
International Faculty Ratio: HKU near the ceiling, HKUST and CUHK edge up slowly
International Faculty Ratio, weighted at 5% but having a lasting effect on overall ranking stability, shows HKU persistently near the maximum score. Its score hovered between 99.8 and 100 across the five years, reaching 100 in the 2025 edition. HKUST’s score on this indicator climbed from 90.2 in 2021 to 93.5 in 2025, while CUHK’s moved from 80.4 to 84.1. The absolute gaps among the three are narrowing, but HKU’s near-saturation leaves it with virtually no room to gain further ground.
Statistics from the Immigration Department (ImmD) on the Admission Scheme for Mainland Talents and Professionals and the General Employment Policy provide another perspective: between 2022 and 2023, the number of Mainland and overseas professionals approved to work in Hong Kong in education and academic research grew by about 12% year-on-year, but the bulk of the increase flowed into departments within UGC-funded institutions whose research output was expanding rapidly. HKUST’s interdisciplinary research hubs – including projects linked to its Guangzhou campus – have recruited faculty with overseas tenured positions, pushing its international faculty share up slightly; CUHK has expanded its overseas academic talent pool through initiatives such as the “Distinguished Scholars Programme” and recruitment for its Shenzhen Research Institute.
Cross-indicator analysis: who has the more sustainable upward momentum?
Comparing the indicators above and measuring them by compound annual growth rate (CAGR) over five years:
- HKU: Academic Reputation CAGR +0.1%, Employer Reputation +1.7%, Citations per Faculty +2.4%, International Faculty near zero fluctuation; overall rank moved from 22 to 17.
- CUHK: Academic Reputation CAGR +0.1%, Employer Reputation +2.6%, Citations per Faculty +5.5%, International Faculty Ratio +0.9%; rank moved from 43 to 36.
- HKUST: Academic Reputation CAGR −0.05%, Employer Reputation −0.3%, Citations per Faculty −4.2%, International Faculty Ratio +0.7%; rank fell from 27 to 47.
This shows that CUHK recorded the strongest gains in Employer Reputation and Citations per Faculty, driving its rank resurgence. HKU, anchored by the sheer height of its Academic Reputation and a steady rise in Employer Reputation, has remained firmly at the top among Hong Kong institutions and notched a jump in 2025. HKUST, burdened for three years by a marked contraction in Citations per Faculty and a slight decline in Employer Reputation, saw its overall ranking slide from 27th in 2021 to 47th; its 2025 rebound, though notable, has not yet closed the gap with CUHK.
It should also be noted that HKUST’s decline did not result from a single-dimension collapse, but from simultaneous pressure across multiple indicators. HKUST’s 2023 Annual Report indicates that the growth rate of its overall research expenditure slowed, and the number of spin-off companies it created decelerated to about 5% per year, which may have constrained its highly cited paper growth rate in certain years. By contrast, HKU’s 2023–24 Annual Report discloses that its Faculty of Medicine and Faculty of Engineering attracted robust cross-border funding from EU and National Natural Science Foundation of China projects, providing support for Citations per Faculty.
Seen alongside higher education statistics published by the Education Bureau (EDB), research postgraduate (RPg) enrolments at HKU and CUHK in the 2022/23 academic year grew by 14% and 18% respectively compared with 2018/19, while HKUST’s RPg enrolment fell by 2%. This disparity in research talent inflow corresponds with the direction of the Citations per Faculty trend.
FAQ
1. Did all three Hong Kong universities improve their rankings in the 2025 QS rankings?
Yes. HKU moved from 26th in 2024 to 17th, CUHK from 47th to 36th and HKUST from 60th to 47th. All three are back inside the global top 47 for the first collective rebound since 2021.
2. Which university recorded the largest increase in Academic Reputation over the past five years?
In absolute terms, HKU’s Academic Reputation rose from 97.7 in the 2021 edition to 98.4 in 2025, a net gain of 0.7 points, higher than CUHK’s +0.3 and HKUST’s −0.2. By percentage change, CUHK moved from 84.6 to 84.9 – a similar increment. In practice, both HKU and CUHK’s academic reputations have been largely stable over the five-year period, without any dramatic divergence.
3. Why did HKUST slide from 27th in 2021 to 47th in 2025?
The chief drag came from a three-year decline in its Citations per Faculty score, which fell from 66.4 in 2021 to 53.4 in 2025, accompanied by a slight retreat in Employer Reputation. HKUST’s Academic Reputation also experienced volatility. Weakening across several indicators simultaneously weighed on its composite rank; improvements in International Faculty Ratio were insufficient to offset the downtrend in research citation impact and employer assessment.
4. On the Employer Reputation indicator, which of CUHK and HKUST performed better?
As of the 2025 edition, CUHK scored 73.8 while HKUST scored 72.1 – CUHK has overtaken HKUST. Over the five-year span, CUHK’s Employer Reputation score gained a net 8.4 points, the sharpest rise among the three, whereas HKUST recorded a net decrease of 1.0 point. CUHK’s employer perception has improved markedly and now outpaces HKUST’s on this measure.