When researching postgraduate courses, one of the tools prospective students use to navigate the multitude of available options is university rankings. These evaluations of higher education institutions use various metrics to compare universities on a national and international scale, providing a snapshot of where these institutions stand in the academic hierarchy.
University rankings can help prospective students find a university that aligns with their academic interests, career aspirations and personal preferences. However, not all ranking systems are the same. Each has its own methodology, criteria and focus areas.
In this article, we examine university rankings and offer insights into the different systems, how they evaluate institutions and where Australian universities sit on a global and national scale.
Does a university ranking matter?
In general, a university ranking can provide important information on a variety of areas such as academic performance, research output, faculty qualifications, local and global impact and student culture. These factors can influence your decision on whether to enrol in a course at a particular institution. So in many ways, a university ranking can be important to consider.
However, it’s important to remember that there are many different university ranking systems that use metrics based on various criteria. But are rankings actually a reliable indicator of a university’s superiority?
When using rankings to guide your decision as a student, make sure your priorities align with the ranking system and the metrics used. Be sure to keep those metrics or criteria in mind as you start exploring rankings.
It’s also important to remember that achieving a good ranking for many factors often takes time – older, more established universities may have a better chance at ranking than younger institutions. So, while newer institutions might rank lower, that doesn’t mean they offer an inferior education.
Take in the bigger picture
While university rankings offer insights into various aspects of an institution, they don’t provide a complete picture. These rankings shouldn’t be the sole basis of your decision-making process. It’s crucial to take a more well-rounded approach and consider other factors like cost, location, campus culture and course offerings that align with your career goals and personal preferences.
Emily Wheeler, strategy manager at Headspace, gives us some insight into her experience choosing a postgraduate health course.
After gaining a nursing and science degree and working as a nurse, Wheeler soon decided to pursue postgraduate study at the university where she had gained her undergraduate qualifications. For her, the choice was easy. “I was familiar with the university and it has a good reputation.”
Her chosen university was also close to home and cheaper than the other university she was considering. “It came down to cost and reputation for me.”
Wheeler recognises that for others, choosing a university can be daunting. “My advice to prospective students would be to talk to the faculty, talk to other students who are going through or have been through the course you’re considering. They can tell you about the experience of attending the university, the culture and level of support you get from the faculty and other students.”
Wheeler notes that some universities offer good pastoral care or extracurricular activities, which do not necessarily appear in rankings. If the experience of university life is important to you, it’s advisable to look beyond rankings and academic results to get a sense of the experience you’ll have at that institution.
How do university rankings work?
A ranking system uses specific metrics to rank universities. These metrics can be based on factors such as:
- An analysis of academic papers
- The university’s academic reputation
- Faculty members’ opinions about the university
- Employer opinions about the university
- The research output of the university
- Student satisfaction surveys
- The quality of faculty and staff
- The employment outcomes of graduates
Whether or not a ranking system is helpful to you as a prospective student depends on the factors being measured.
Always keep in mind what matters to you. Is it the quality of the research or how employers will view your qualifications? Perhaps it’s the location or student experience. Maybe you want to engage in research and work with top academics. Some of these factors are measured by rankings, others aren’t. Let’s explore a few different systems.
University rankings for health courses
So, how are universities ranked? Remember, each ranking system has its own methodology and scores universities based on its own criteria. This means that a university’s position can vary depending on the ranking system used. Here are three well-known university ranking systems you might come across in your research.
The "=" symbol indicates that the university is tied with one or more other universities in the rankings.
QS World University Rankings: Life Sciences and Medicine
In 2025, the QS World University Rankings featured over 1600 institutions from around the globe. The results were taken from the more than 17 million academic papers and expert opinions submitted by 240,000 faculty and university staff members.
The QS World University Rankings are also broken down into five broad subject areas, of which Life Sciences and Medicine is one.
The QS World Rankings use different measurements as part of their methodology, which include a lens, an indicator and a metric. A lens is a group of indicators that relate to a theme, an indicator is a measurement of a single aspect of an institution's performance and a metric is a more specific calculation that comprises an indicator. Collectively, this methodology contributes to the overall ranking given to an institution.
The lens consists of five measurements, which are further broken down into their relevant indicators as follows:
- Research and discovery: academic reputation and citations per faculty
- Employability and outcomes: employer reputation and employment outcomes
- Learning experience: faculty-to-student ratio
- Global engagement: international faculty ratio, international research network, international student diversity, international student ratio
- Sustainability: environmental and social sustainability
As well as ranking the overall subject of Life Sciences and Medicine, this system also shows the top universities for individual subject areas such as nursing and psychology.
2025 QS World University Rankings for Life Sciences and Medicine
The table below highlights Australian universities that currently rank for the Life Sciences and Medicine category.
| Global rank | University |
| 15 | The University of Melbourne |
| 24 | The University of Sydney |
| =34 | Monash University |
| 37 | The University of Queensland |
| 54 | University of New South Wales |
| =99 | University of Adelaide |
| =114 | The University of Western Australia |
| =140 | Australian National University |
| =193 | University of Newcastle |
| =253 | La Trobe University |
| =253 | Queensland University of Technology |
| =261 | Deakin University |
| =261 | University of Technology Sydney |
| =282 | Curtin University |
| =289 | Griffith University |
| =305 | Macquarie University |
| =309 | Flinders University |
| =323 | University of Tasmania |
| =352 | University of South Australia |
| =352 | University of Wollongong |
| =359 | Western Sydney University |
| 401-450 | James Cook University |
| 451-500 | RMIT University |
Times Higher Education World University Rankings: medical and health
The Times Higher Education World University Rankings place particular emphasis on universities’ research capabilities and rank the institutions against 18 performance indicators in the areas of:
- The teaching and learning environment
- The research environment in terms of income, volume and reputation
- The quality output of research in terms of research excellence, influence and strength
- How knowledge transfers to industry with respect to income and patents
- International outlook in terms of research, staff and students
This ranking system has medical and health subject rankings in the areas of medicine, dentistry and other health subjects. The weightings of each of the performance indicators vary depending on the particular subject being measured. So for health subjects, the teaching, research quality and research environment indicators have more weight than the industry and international outlook weightings.
2025 Times Higher Education World University Rankings for medical and health
The table below highlights Australian universities that currently rank for the medical and health category.
| Global rank | University |
|---|---|
| 20 | University of Melbourne |
| 31 | Monash University |
| 35 | The University of Sydney |
| 57 | The University of Queensland |
| =71 | University of New South Wales |
| 89 | University of Adelaide |
| 101-125 | Australian National University |
| 126-150 | The University of Western Australia |
| 151-175 | La Trobe University |
| 151-175 | Macquarie University |
| 151-175 | University of Technology Sydney |
| 176-200 | Queensland University of Technology |
| 201-250 | Deakin University |
| 201-250 | Flinders University |
| 201-250 | University of Newcastle |
| 201-250 | Western Sydney University |
| 251-300 | Australian Catholic University |
| 251-300 | Bond University |
| 251-300 | Curtin University |
| 251-300 | Griffith University |
| 251-300 | Murdoch University |
| 251-300 | University of South Australia |
| 251-300 | University of Wollongong |
| 301-400 | Edith Cowan University |
| 301-400 | Federation University |
| 301-400 | James Cook University |
| 301-400 | RMIT University |
| 301-400 | University of Tasmania |
| 301-400 | Victoria University |
| 401-500 | Central Queensland University |
| 401-500 | Swinburne University of Technology |
| 401-500 | University of Canberra |
| 401-500 | University of Southern Queensland |
| 401-500 | University of Sunshine Coast |
| 501-600 | Charles Darwin University |
| 601-800 | Charles Sturt University |
| 601-800 | Southern Cross University |
| 601-800 | The University of Notre Dame |
AFR Best Universities Ranking
An exclusively Australian university rankings system, the AFR Best Universities Ranking was launched in late 2023.
This system rates universities on four metrics:
- Research
- Teaching
- Career
- Equity
The Australian Financial Review reports that the ranking system considers dozens of objective data sources, while the league table differs from other global lists, which they claim are based on more narrow measures. The result is a system that offers a more nuanced view of Australian universities.
The measure of equity and access is not featured in international rankings. However, this metric is fundamental for many outer-suburb and regional Australian universities. The AFR university rankings recognise younger, less established institutions that may not yet have the prestige or academic performance data compared to some of the more established Australian tertiary institutions.
This ranking system evaluates each university as a whole, rather than focusing on education and research metrics solely. This gives prospective students a well-rounded understanding of each institution, helping them to make an informed choice when it comes to their tertiary education.
Best Universities Ranking 2025
| Australian rank | University |
|---|---|
| 1 | The University of Melbourne |
| 2 | The University of Queensland |
| 3 | University of New South Wales |
| =4 | Monash University |
| 5 | Australian National University |
| 6 | The University of Sydney |
| 7 | University of Adelaide |
| =8 | University of Technology Sydney |
| =8 | University of Wollongong |
| =10 | Deakin University |
| =10 | University of South Australia |
| 12 | The University of Western Australia |
| =13 | Edith Cowan University |
| =13 | Macquarie University |
| =15 | Central Queensland University |
| =15 | University of Newcastle |
| =17 | Flinders University |
| =17 | James Cook University |
| =19 | Bond University |
| =19 | Griffith University |
| =19 | RMIT University |
| =22 | Curtin University |
| =22 | La Trobe University |
| =22 | Swinburne University of Technology |
| =22 | University of Tasmania |
| =26 | Murdoch University |
| =26 | Queensland University of Technology |
| =28 | University of Southern Queensland |
| =29 | Australian Catholic University |
| =29 | Western Sydney University |
| =31 | Charles Sturt University |
| =31 | University of Canberra |
| =31 | University of the Sunshine Coast |
| =34 | Charles Darwin University |
| =34 | Victoria University |
| =36 | Federation University |
| =36 | Southern Cross University |
| 38 | University of New England |
| 39 | The University of Notre Dame |
| 40 | Torrens University |
How to decide which institution is right for you
While university rankings provide a valuable tool for prospective students to assess and compare institutions, it’s crucial to understand the features of the different ranking systems and other elements that help a university stand out so you can make an informed decision about your future educational path.
If you want to explore some options, browse the range of healthcare courses available from Australian universities. You might discover a course and institution that aligns well with your preferences, career goals and study needs. For example, the University of Technology Sydney, which ranked among the top 300 universities worldwide in the Life Sciences and Medicine category in the 2025 QS World University Rankings.
The University of Technology Sydney is also in the top 175 universities globally for Medical and Health subjects, while James Cook University, Edith Cowan University and Victoria University ranked among the top 400 universities for this category in the 2025 Times Higher Education World University Rankings.
Both the University of Technology Sydney and Southern Cross University rank in the top 250 and 300 for psychology respectively. The University of Canberra consistently ranks for research quality, while in recent years Southern Cross University has risen in both the QS Rankings and Times Higher Education rankings.
Many Australian and international universities also demonstrate excellence in contributing to a variety of global sustainable development outcomes. The impact that these universities make on a worldwide scale highlights a broader dedication beyond academic achievement and reputation to improving social, economic and environmental challenges.
In the 2025 Times Higher Education Impact Rankings, several Australian universities were included in some notable categories. James Cook University ranked #3 globally for Good Health and Wellbeing, #5 for Gender Equality and placed within the top 400 for Climate Action. Victoria University ranked #10 for Reduced Inequalities and #17 for Global Partnerships. Similarly, the University of Canberra ranked #3 for Good Health and Wellbeing, 5th for Gender Equality and 10th for Reduced Inequalities.
Considering these broader aspects of an institution’s culture, values and impact helps you make a well-rounded, informed decision about whether it aligns with your goals and needs.
Explore healthcare opportunities with Australian universities
Every university has a unique culture and academic reputation and sometimes the younger ones can rival their more established peers. Understanding the value of university rankings in Australia and the different methodologies used can help you find the institution that best suits your study interests and career goals.
We showcase various healthcare courses from respected Australian universities. Discover courses in a range of healthcare fields, including psychology, nursing, public health, health leadership and management, counselling, social work and mental health. To transform your healthcare career, select a course that interests you and enquire with our Education Consultant today.
If you’d like to learn more about or enrol in a postgraduate healthcare degree, book a free professional development strategy call with our Education Consultant, Catriona, who is ready to help you make your next career move.
