In this year’s Shanghai Ranking, the Technical University of Munich (TUM) is ranked highest among all German universities, the University announced today, August 17, 2016. The TUM has improved its ranking by four places compared to last year, placing 47th overall – it shares its top spot with Heidelberg University. Only one other German university ranks among the top 100 universities worldwide, the Ludwig Maximilian University of Munich (51st place).

The "Academic Ranking of World Universities", which was developed by scientists at Jiao Tong University in Shanghai, rates the research efforts of universities worldwide. It especially takes into account the volume of publications in important journals such as Nature and Science, researchers’ citation rates and the number of scientists and alumni who have been awarded Nobel Prizes and Fields Medals – one of the highest honors in the field of mathematics.

TUM once again placed third among the technical universities in Europe. Only two institutions are ranked higher on the list: ETH Zurich (19th place) and Imperial College London (22nd place). The next-ranked European technical university is the Ecole Polytechnique Fédérale in Lausanne, which took 92nd place.

TUM is especially strong in the category of most cited researchers internationally. Eight TUM scientists belong to one per cent of the most cited top researchers in their fields. TUM also achieved a very good result for the alumni indicator, which measures the quality of education by the number of Nobel Prize winners among the alumni and other factors.

Munich’s Technical University is also ranked in the top five of Europe's most innovative universities.