Key Points

"In the 2026 edition of the world rankings, to be published at the World Academic Summit on 8 October this year, India will break new records to become the second best represented nation in the world, behind only the US," Phil Baty, chief global affairs officer, Times Higher Education, said .

"In 2019, the year before NEP 2020, India had a respectable 49 universities in the rankings - a share of around 4 per cent of all ranked universities. In the 2026 edition, India's representation will have almost tripled, to 128 ranked universities, representing almost six per cent of all ranked universities," he added.

The remarks of Phil Baty have come on the fifth anniversary of India's National Education Policy.

He said the achievement reflects a nation-wide commitment from Indian universities to collect better data, to step forward and subject themselves to global data benchmarking, to put themselves on the world stage alongside the top research universities worldwide and to be a visible and active part of the global academic community, where research collaboration and talent exchange can help them to thrive further.

The expert said that it is not just in representation where India is showing exceptional progress, there are improvements in quality too.

He said India's National Education Policy of 2020 was "so pioneering and bold" that many said at its launch five years ago that it was simply too ambitious to succeed.

"One commentator wrote in Times Higher Education at the time that the vision of Prime Minister Narendra Modi was inspiring, and the planned reforms were commendable, 'however, whether any of this comes to pass remains unclear.... it is far from a given that the document will even be implemented'. But exactly five years since the NEP 2020 was formally launched, on July 29, 2020, there is a growing body of independent evidence that despite the dramatic disruption of the Covid pandemic, the bold vision is rapidly becoming a reality," he said.

"Certainly, regarding ambitions to improve higher education quality, and to finally embrace the full internationalisation of Indian higher education, Times Higher Education's data is clear: the plans are working," he added.

The Times Higher Education World University Rankings assess globally-facing research-intensive universities across 18 rigorous performance metrics, focussed on excellence in teaching, research, international outlook and vital knowledge transfer between universities and industry.

He said India is improving its "research quality" ranking performance.

"I can reveal today that in the forthcoming 2026 edition, several Indian universities will record their highest ever ranking positions and India as a whole will be one of the most improved nations year-on-year overall," he said.

"This reflects improvement across multiple areas, but it is in the key area of research where India's leading universities are making the most rapid progress. Indeed, India was the single most rapidly improving nation for THE's "research quality" ranking performance pillar among larger nations in last year's ranking," he added.

Baty said the data is clear that India's universities are increasingly rubbing shoulders with the world's global research elite.

"But based on an additional, very different set of performance metrics based on their social and economic impact, India's universities are also starting to really shine."

The Times Higher Education Impact Rankings (re-launched for 2026 as the Sustainability Impact Ratings), assess universities social and economic impact based on their contribution to the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs).

Universities are examined on their teaching, their research, their community outreach, and on the stewardship of their own resources, across hundreds of metrics based on all 17 of the UN SDGs.

The latest results were published at the Global Sustainable Development Congress last month - and India was a world leader.

In the overall Impact ranking, India had eight world top-200 ranked universities, and across a range of vital individual SDGs, it has a smattering of world top-ten universities. For SDG7 "clean and affordable energy", India has no fewer than three universities in the world top ten.

"At its launch five years ago, Prime Minster Narendra Modi said that the 'National Education Policy will set the foundation for 21st century India'. Thanks to the boldness of the ambition, a nation-wide implementation drive, and the embrace of international performance standards, the foundations are now laid for India to take it's rightful place to help lead the next 75 years of the Asian century," Baty said.

- ANI