Universiti Teknologi Petronas (UTP) became the first Malaysian university to rank in the top 50 of the Times Higher Education (THE) Asia University Rankings 2025. It jumped to a tie at position 43 with Hanyang University. Twenty-three local universities featured on the list, with some registering an improvement over last year. Universiti Malaya improved one notch to rank 64th, and Sunway University jumped tremendously from being formerly ranked in the 201–250 band to rank 141st.
Apart from Universiti Malaya, two other public universities also recorded some improvements, which saw Universiti Malaysia Pahang Al-Sultan Abdullah improve to rank 163rd from 166th and Universiti Pendidikan Sultan Idris improve to rank 173rd from 180th.
Yet, several of the country's leading local universities had different outcomes, as two of the public universities registered a significant fall in rankings. Universiti Putra Malaysia slipped to 132nd from 102nd, while Universiti Utara Malaysia fell to 127th from 110th in 2024.
At the same time, some other universities declined in ranking, such as Universiti Teknologi Malaysia, which moved down from 85th to 86th, and Universiti Kebangsaan Malaysia, which declined two positions to 103rd. It tied with Universiti Sains Malaysia, which was at 99th place last year.
Multimedia University, Universiti Malaysia Sarawak and Universiti Malaysia Terengganu were all placed in the 301–350 band, whereas Universiti Tunku Abdul Rahman was in the 351–400 band. Placed in the 401–500 bracket were Management and Science University and Universiti Tun Hussein Onn Malaysia, whereas Universiti Malaysia Perlis, Universiti Sultan Zainal Abidin and Universiti Teknologi Mara all featured in the 501–600 bracket. Last but not least, three other local institutions placed outside the top 600 institutions were Universiti Kuala Lumpur, Universiti Malaysia Kelantan and Universiti Teknikal Malaysia Melaka.
For 2025, another 114 universities were added to the ranking, making a total of 853 universities from 31 countries and regions in Asia. The universities have been ranked against 18 performance indicators including research quality, international outlook, teaching and industry.
With regard to the number of universities featured in THE's Asia University Rankings of the 13th edition, Japan led with 119, followed by India with 107, China with 94, Turkey with 91 and Iran with 81.
