Universities in Asia

Higher Education in Asia

Introduction

What are the most popular Universities in each Asian country? uniRank tries to answer this question by publishing a list of Asian countries and providing a ranking of their higher-education institutions meeting the following uniRank selection criteria:

  • being chartered, licensed or accredited by the appropriate higher education-related organization in each Asian country
  • offering at least four-year undergraduate degrees (bachelor degrees) or postgraduate degrees (master or doctoral degrees)
  • delivering courses predominantly in a traditional, face-to-face, non-distance education format
uniRank's aim is to provide a non-academic League Table of the top Universities in each Asian country based on valid, unbiased and non-influenceable web metrics provided by independent web intelligence sources rather than data submitted by the Universities themselves. At the bottom of the page we also provide a brief overview of the higher education in Asia.

Asian Universities by Country

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Snapshot of Higher Education in Asia (2020 data)

  1. Asian Universities World Representation

    Higher Education and Universities in Asia
  2. How many Universities are there in Asia? According to the uniRank database in 2020 there are currently 5,984 officially recognized higher-education institutions in Asia. Considering that the uniRank database includes a total number of 13,723 officially recognized higher education institutions the proportion of Asian Universities in the world is as follows:
    • uniRank Asian Universities World Representation Index: 43.6%
    Being the estimated population of the Asian continent around 59.8% of the total world population (source: United Nations' World Population Prospects, the 2015 Revision), the Asian Higher education system and offerings seem to be strongly underrepresented in the world at least in terms of the number of higher education institutions.
  3. Public vs Private Universities in Asia

  4. How many public and private Universities are there in Asia? Out of the total number of 5,984 recognized higher educations institutions in Asia included in the uniRank database, 2,622 are public (i.e. officially affiliated to or run by national, state or local governments) and 2,901 are private. The type of control of the remaining Asian Universities included in the uniRank database is unknown or it has not been reported.

    In terms of the number of public versus private Universities, the uniRank database shows a slightly higher presence of private higher education institutions in the Asian continent as a whole. However, 182 out of the top 200 Universities in Asia (91%) are public higher education institutions. Differences and peculiarities may still exist in each Asian country higher education system.


  5. Non-profit vs for-profit Universities in Asia

  6. What type of entities are Universities in Asia? Out of the total number of 5,984 recognized higher educations institutions in Asia included in the uniRank database, 2,681 are non-profit and 280 are for-profit. The type of entity of the remaining Asian Universities included in the uniRank database is unknown or it has not been reported. As a general rule, the vast majority of Asian public higher education institutions are not-for-profit organisations, not necessarily in legal terms but certainly in terms of nature and institutional purposes such as role, scope and mission.


  7. Challenges for the higher education system in Asia

  8. What are the main challenges that higher education in Asia has to currently face? According to uniRank the main issues of the higher education system in Asia are enrollment growth and capacity, inadequate funding and lack of harmonization of the higher education systems in the Asian continent as a whole.


  9. Top 200 Universities in Asia

  10. uniRank publishes twice a year a non-academic ranking of the top 200 Universities in Asia based on valid, unbiased and non-influenceable web metrics provided by independent web intelligence sources. Please read the ranking methodology in the About Us page for more information.

    According to the 2020 uniRank University Ranking this is the list of the top 10 Universities in Asia:

    more top Universities in Asia