Gloomy Picture for Pakistan in QS World University Rankings

Education is a vital element in a nation’s advancement and mirrors its developmental path. However, recent data from the QS global university ranking organization presents a concerning outlook for Pakistan.

The rankings reveal that no Pakistani university secured a spot among the world’s top 350. Nevertheless, Quaid-e-Azam University (354) and the National University of Science and Technology (NUST) (371) managed to be in the top 371.

The University of Karachi, the country’s largest, made it into the top 1,001, but no other university from Sindh was able to reach the top 1,500.

Other Pakistani universities that secured positions in the rankings include Punjab University (542), Lahore University of Management Sciences (555), and the University of Agriculture, Faisalabad (654).

Further down the list, COMSATS University, Islamabad is ranked at 664, the Pakistan Institute of Engineering and Applied Sciences at 721, UET Lahore at 801, the University of Peshawar at 901, Lahore University at 951, Aga Khan University and the University of Karachi at 1001, Bahauddin Zakaria University, International Islamic University, Rifah International University, and the University of Management and Technology at 1,201, while Islamia University of Bahawalpur is placed at 1,401.

In the 2025 South Asian rankings, the University of Karachi holds the 58th position, followed by Aga Khan University at 62nd, IBA Karachi at 70th, Iqra University at 110th, IBA Sukkur at 120th, NED University at 131st, Dow University of Health Sciences at 140th, Mehran Engineering University Jamshoro at 168th, Ziauddin University at 240th, Sindh University Jamshoro at 263rd, and the University of Balochistan at 278th.

Globally, the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) leads the rankings, with Imperial College London (UK) following in second place.

The list of top universities also features Stanford University (US) in 3rd, the University of Oxford (UK) in 4th, Harvard University (US) in 5th, Cambridge University (UK) in sixth, ETH Zurich (SZ) in 7th, the National University of Singapore (SZ) in 8th, UCL London (UCL) in ninth, and the California Institute of Technology (US) in 10th position.