The 2016 ranking of the world top 100 universities places unsurprisingly the United States at the top with 50 universities, one less than in 2015. The United Kingdom, number 2, comes far behind with 8 universities. Number three is Australia with 6, followed by Japan, Switzerland and Canada, all with 4 universities in the top 100 pot. The world best-in-class universities are dominantly located in the North American and European regions, the exceptions being Israel, Australia and Japan.

The hierarchy is reversed when considering the number of institutions per capita (in this instance, per million population, times 100). Under this criterion, the smaller countries put forward a proud performance, placing Switzerland, Denmark, Sweden and Israel, in this order at the top.

Switzerland achieves a per capita index of 48.1, that is 2.7 times the median. The giant USA occupy a modest 11th rank out of 18, with a score of 0.9, marginally below the median and the average (red horizontal line in the chart). The picture is even less kind to the likes of France, Germany, Japan, Russia and China that fill the lowest slots of the list, with comparatively low scores, well below the median and the average.

Sources: Institute of Higher Education, Shanghai and UN Population Division.

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