The University of California offers some of the best education in the nation and the world, according to two newly released rankings.
UC's nine undergraduate campuses all made the grade for the 2023 edition of The Princeton Review's Best 388 Colleges list, released Aug. 17. The assessment is based on annual data from over 2,000 schools, input from The Princeton Review's 23-member National College Counselor Advisory Board, and survey responses from students about their experiences. The compilation provides information on a wide range of colleges, all of which the Princeton Review deems to be outstanding. The Princeton Review does not rank colleges within its 388 selected and does not include graduate-only institutions like UC San Francisco.
Each UC campus also made ShanghaiRanking Consultancy’s 2022 Academic Ranking of World Universities, released Aug. 15.
| Campus | World rank | National/regional rank |
| UC Berkeley | 5 | 4 |
| UCLA | 13 | 11 |
| UC San Francisco | 19 | 15 |
| UC San Diego | 21 | 16 |
| UC Santa Barbara | 57 | 32 |
| UC Irvine | 61 | 33 |
| UC Davis | 101-150 | 40-54 |
| UC Santa Cruz | 151-200 | 55-62 |
| UC Riverside | 201-300 | 63-85 |
| UC Merced | 401-500 | 107-127 |
ShanghaiRanking Consultancy evaluated 2,500 universities from around the globe to determine the world’s best.
UC Berkeley ranked No. 4 in the United States and No. 5 in the world, outperforming Ivy League colleges like Princeton University, as well as the University of Oxford in Oxford, England. UCLA was just behind at No. 11 nationally and No. 13 in the world, with UC San Francisco following at No. 15 and No. 19, respectively. UC San Diego ranked No. 16 nationally and No. 21 internationally, while UC Santa Barbara and UC Irvine were also among the top 75 best schools in the world. (Read UC San Diego’s story on the rankings, with comments from Chancellor Pradeep K. Khosla, here).
UC also boasts four of the top five public universities in America on the list: UC Berkeley (No.1), UCLA (No. 2), UC San Francisco (No. 4) and UC San Diego (No. 5).
The Academic Ranking of World Universities is based on a set of six criteria, with an emphasis on academics and research. The criteria include the number of alumni and faculty winning Nobel Prizes and Fields Medals; the number of highly cited researchers; the number of articles published in the journals Nature and Science; the number of articles indexed in Science Citation Index - Expanded and Social Sciences Citation Index; and per capita academic performance.
The UC system excels year after year across a wide range of rankings focused on academics, educational excellence and value. Most recently UC hospitals led the state and nation in the U.S. News & World Report’s 2022-2023 Best Hospitals ranking.
