France's Paris-Saclay has emerged as the highest-ranked European university in the 2024 Shanghai Ranking, placing 12th overall. Meanwhile American universities, led by Harvard, have once again claimed the top spots.
This year's Shanghai Ranking has placed French universities in the spotlight, with Paris-Saclay achieving the highest ever score for a French institution.
The move, praised by President Emmanuel Macron, reflects the growing international recognition of French academic standards.
France now has 25 universities in the global top 1,000, with 18 in the top 500. Notable movers include Université Paris Sciences Lettres, up to 33rd place, the Sorbonne at 41st, and Paris City University, which climbed to 60th.
Aix-Marseille, Strasbourg, and Grenoble Alpes also feature in the top 150.
Macron credits these improvements to recent reforms and investments in French higher education, including the Research Programming Law and the France 2030 initiative.
With this year's ranking, France has become the third most-represented country in the top 20, a significant development noted by Higher Education Minister Sylvie Retailleau, who pointed out the growing interest from international students.
The Shanghai Ranking, initiated in 2003 by Shanghai Jiaotong University, focuses heavily on research achievements, such as Nobel laureates, Fields medalists, and publications in top journals like Science and Nature.
This year, Harvard, Stanford, and MIT continue to dominate the top spots, with Cambridge and Oxford also in the top 10.
More than 2,500 institutions were evaluated to determine the global top 1,000.
