Whether you’re planning on doing a degree in rocket science or are pursuing a career as a fashion designer, Europe has a load of impressive institutions to choose from.

But choice can be a little overwhelming – after all, there are great universities everywhere, from the world’s oldest university in Bologna to modern technological institutions in cities like Nuremberg. 

But we can all take a deep breath, as the Academic Ranking of World Universities has been published for 2024, and now we know where in the continent has the best places to study.

England’s Cambridge and Oxford claimed spots one and two in this list, and scored fourth and sixth respectively in the top 10 universities in the world ranking. 

Paris-Saclay University claims third place, and the French capital has a bunch of other institutions that earned their place in the upper echelons of higher education – PSL University, the Sorbonne and Université Paris Cité are all also included in the top 20. Check out the rest below. 

These are the 20 best universities in Europe

1. University of Cambridge
2. University of Oxford
3. Paris-Saclay University
4. University College London
5. ETH Zurich
6. Imperial College London
7. University of Copenhagen
8. PSL University
9. University of Edinburgh
10. Sorbonne University
11. Karolinska University
12. University of Munich
13. Technical University of Munich
14. Heidelberg University
15. University of Manchester
16. King’s College London
17. Swiss Federal Institute of Technology Lausanne
18. Utrecht University
19. University of Geneva
20. Université Paris Cité

Too school for cool

Making the decision on where to spend the next few years while you’re studying can be daunting, but we’re here to help. Time Out has covered roundups from QS Top Universities about the best institutions in the world for 2025, one about the prettiest campuses on the planet, and one about the best cities in which to be a student. 

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