Israel’s academic standing slips as Technion falls out of global top 100
The Weizmann Institute and Hebrew University remain among the world's leading research institutions, but growing competition from China and other countries is putting pressure on Israeli academia.
For the first time since 2020, Israel no longer has three universities among the world's top 100 in the prestigious Shanghai Ranking. The change comes after the Technion, which has steadily slipped in the rankings in recent years, fell out of the top 100. The Weizmann Institute of Science, ranked 71st, and the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, ranked 89th, remained in the top 100.
The Shanghai Ranking, published annually since 2003, measures research performance at academic institutions around the world. Its criteria include the number of Nobel and Fields Medal winners among a university's researchers and alumni, the number of highly cited researchers, the number of papers published in leading journals such as Nature and Science, and other indicators of research performance. The ranking evaluates more than 2,500 universities and publishes a list of the top 1,000.
The Weizmann Institute has slipped gradually in recent years, from 68th place in 2023 to 69th in 2024 and 71st in 2025. It maintained 71st place in 2026.
The Hebrew University ranked 86th in 2023, climbed to 81st in 2024, and fell back to 88th in 2025. This year, it slipped another place to 89th.
The Technion's decline has been more pronounced. It ranked 79th in 2023, 83rd in 2024 and 97th in 2025. This year, it fell into the 101-150 range, which the Shanghai Ranking publishes as a group rather than assigning individual positions.
Tel Aviv University is ranked in the 151-200 range, Ben-Gurion University of the Negev in the 401-500 range, Bar-Ilan University in the 501-600 range and the University of Haifa in the 601-700 range.
Israel's long-standing presence of three universities in the top 100 has been a notable achievement for a relatively small country. One factor behind the strong performance of Israeli universities is the country's high number of Nobel and Fields Medal winners relative to its population. Universities have also increasingly focused on improving their performance in international rankings, including by increasing publications in prestigious scientific journals.
But maintaining those positions is becoming increasingly difficult as universities in Asia and the Middle East make rapid progress and governments pour significantly greater resources into higher education and research.
Three of the four universities that entered the top 100 this year were Chinese. China now has 16 universities among the world's top 100, up from 13 in 2025.
The trend highlights the growing competitive pressure on Israeli academia. While Israeli universities continue to produce high-level research, they are competing with institutions backed by far larger investments in research infrastructure, scientific talent and international collaboration.
The Technion's decline is particularly notable given its efforts to expand its international footprint. The university has established campuses in Guangdong, China, and Manhattan in recent years, initiatives that have helped expand its international collaborations.
At the top of the global ranking, Harvard University retained first place, followed by Stanford University and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. The University of Cambridge ranked fourth, while the University of California, Berkeley rounded out the top five.
U.S. universities dominate the ranking, accounting for eight of the world's top 10 institutions and 14 of the top 20. The United Kingdom has two universities in the top 10, Cambridge and Oxford.
The Technion said its decline in this year's Shanghai Ranking was largely attributable to the removal of one of its researchers from the list of the world's highly cited researchers. It said the change does not reflect a deterioration in the university's research or teaching.
The university also noted that it had improved its position in several other major international rankings and ranked first in Israel in several fields, including engineering, computer science and artificial intelligence.
