Nationwide (and global) university rankings are all well and good, but different unis do different things. Medicine or architecture, law or drama – some places specialise in producing experts in a select few fields. Which is why every year QS University Rankings also ranks educational institutions by subject.
This year’s QS University Rankings By Subject have been revealed, and British universities did exceptionally across the board. In ‘life sciences and medicine’, notably, Oxford University came second overall.
Another area of QS’s subject lists that UK universities excelled in was ‘art and humanities’, which covers everything from music and art to architecture, classics, history, philosophy and languages. In this category, British unis occupied both second and third places overall.
Which two universities, exactly, is a bit more predictable. Oxford came second and Cambridge third. The country’s two most famous universities also did well in QS’s overall ranking last year.
So, how did Oxbridge come to occupy both silver and bronze medal positions? Well, Oxford came joint-top of the leaderboard for English language and literature, then second for archaeology, history and modern languages. The UK’s oldest university then simply did well across many of the other disciplines, coming third for theology, fourth for linguistics and classics/ancient history, and fifth for philosophy.
Cambridge, by contrast, topped more subject lists (archaeology, modern languages, joint for English language/literature) but wasn’t such an all-rounder. Cambridge came third for history (third overall), fourth for linguistics and theology, and fifth for classics/ancient history.
So, the Oxford-Cambridge rivalry is still clearly alive and well in 2025! Oxbridge weren’t the only unis to do well in QS’s humanities and arts lists. UCL’s The Bartlett School topped the architecture table, and three London unis came top for ‘music’ (Royal College of Music, Royal Academy of Music and Guildhall).
You can check out QS’s 2025 subject lists in full here.
The UK’s universities with Time Out
Looking into unis? We’ve reported on rankings, Times Higher Education (and THE subject rankings) QS Top Universities and the Academic Ranking of World Universities, as we know picking where to go to uni is one hell of a decision. Then there’s roundups of the prettiest campuses on the planet, and the best cities to be a student, because life isn’t all about studying, right?
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