Hà Nội Medical University, one of the new Vietnamese representatives to appear in the best universities in Asia ranked by Times Higher Education (THE) 2025. Photo thuonghieucongluan.com.vn

HÀ NỘI – Việt Nam this year has nine universities, three more than last year, listed in the highly respected Times Higher Education (THE) rankings.

Announced on April 23, THE has listed its top universities in Asia based on many factors including research quality and teaching.

Among the nine Vietnamese institutions, six were already ranked last year. The three newcomers are the University of Economics HCM City (UEH), Hà Nội Medical University and HCM City Open University.

Notably, UEH – a new entrant – ranked the highest among Vietnamese universities, at position 136, followed by Tôn Đức Thắng University (group 201–250) and Duy Tân University (group 251–300).

The chairman of the UEH Council, Professor Dr Nguyễn Đông Phong, said that this achievement marks an early fulfilment of one of the university’s strategic goals for the 2025–2045 period, of entering the top 250 universities in Asia by 2030 and the top 150 by 2045.

“This result not only reflects the tremendous efforts of UEH staff, but also reaffirms our strategic direction of a sustainable, multidisciplinary development,” said Phong.

Similarly, Hà Nội Medical University and HCM City Open University debuted at positions in the 401–500 and 501–600 brackets, respectively.

The remaining universities, which were also ranked last year, include Hà Nội University of Science and Technology, Việt Nam National University Hà Nội, Việt Nam National University HCM City and Huế University.

Their rankings remained largely unchanged, in the 501–600 and 601+ groups.

Regionally, China continues to dominate the rankings, with Tsinghua University and Beijing University maintaining first and second places, respectively. China also remains the only country with seven universities in the top ten.

Other institutions in the top ten are the National University of Singapore (third), Nanyang Technological University (fourth), and the University of Tokyo (fifth).

For 2025, THE ranked 853 universities from over 30 countries and territories, with four countries of Uzbekistan, Bahrain, Mongolia and Syria, included for the first time.

Universities were assessed based on 18 indicators across five categories including research quality (30 per cent), research environment (28 per cent), teaching (24.5 per cent), knowledge transfer income (10 per cent) and international outlook (7.5 per cent). VNS