CityU in the \"young university\" rankings: THE Young University Rankings and the \"Under 50\" tables

City University of Hong Kong (CityUHK) is a fixture in global young-university rankings: it finished a record fourth among 673 ranked institutions in the THE Young University Rankings 2024^※, marking its eighth consecutive year in the global top ten; it placed eighth globally in the QS "Under 50" 2024 edition; THE announced in 2025 that the series would be suspended.

This piece focuses on the specialist young-university tables — a yardstick that, unlike the comprehensive overall rankings, measures which institutions among their "peers" are moving fastest, and one that fits neatly with CityUHK's positioning narrative of being "small and focused, yet young". For year-by-year trends and the methodologies of the big four global rankings (QS, THE, U.S. News, ARWU), see the World Rankings Overview and Methodologies of the Four Major Rankings.

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# How old is CityUHK? And how is "young" defined?

CityUHK has two possible start dates, and getting this right is essential for understanding the different ranking tables.

The institution's predecessor, the City Polytechnic of Hong Kong, was formally established on 1 January 1984^※, admitting its first cohort of about 480 full-time and 680 part-time students in October of that year. In 1994 the polytechnic was granted university status and renamed City University of Hong Kong^※. THE's Young University Rankings set the eligibility threshold at "institutions founded within the 50 years preceding the ranking year" — for the 2024 edition the cut-off was institutions founded after 1974^※, which CityUHK (founded 1984) comfortably meets. The QS "Under 50" ranking operates on the same principle, using the reference year of QS World University Rankings release. CityUHK will therefore remain eligible for such tables until at least the mid-2030s (counting from 1984). Worth noting: the University of Hong Kong (founded 1911) and The Chinese University of Hong Kong (founded 1963) no longer qualify; CityUHK's "young" identity is, among Hong Kong institutions, a distinctive competitive asset.

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# What is the THE Young University Rankings? How does its methodology differ?

The Times Higher Education (THE) Young University Rankings are a specialist table for institutions aged 50 years or under. They use exactly the same indicator framework as THE's flagship World University Rankings (WUR), but the weightings are recalibrated — the core adjustment is "reducing the weight of reputation to better reflect the mission profile of young universities"^※.

THE Young University Rankings 2024: five pillar weightings

(Source: THE Young University Rankings 2024 methodology^※)

The biggest difference from the main table is the "de-reputationing". In the THE WUR, the two reputation survey components (Teaching Reputation and Research Reputation) together account for more than 30% of the total score. In the young-university table these weights are reduced, so as to dampen the halo effect that benefits long-established institutions — for universities only a few decades old, hard research data is a truer gauge of competitiveness than a prestigious name. This is also why some young universities rank significantly higher in this specialist table than they do in the overall THE WUR.

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# CityUHK's year-by-year trajectory in the THE Young University Rankings

CityUHK has now spent eight consecutive years in the THE Young University top ten^※, with a clear upward trend in the most recent three editions — climbing from 10th in 2022, to 6th in 2023, to a record 4th in 2024.

THE Young University Rankings: CityUHK's verified positions

The 2024 result moved CityUHK up two places from the previous year. Professor Freddy Boey, President of CityUHK, said in the official press release^※: "CityUHK rose to No. 4 for the first time in THE Best Young Universities ranking and is once again ranked in the top 10 best young universities globally." (「城大首次在 THE 最佳年輕大學榜上升至第四名，再度躋身全球十強。」)

Three indicator highlights from the 2024 THE Young University Rankings:

(Per CityUHK official press release, 14 May 2024)

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# Who else was in the THE 2024 Young University top ten? How many from Hong Kong?

In the THE Young University Rankings 2024 top ten^※, Hong Kong accounted for three places — The Hong Kong University of Science and Technology (HKUST) at 3rd, CityUHK at 4th, and The Hong Kong Polytechnic University (PolyU) at 7th — a density rarely seen in any single territory. The full top ten:

(Source: THE Young University Rankings 2024 results announcement^※)

The three Hong Kong institutions occupy third, fourth and seventh places. In contrast, HKU and CUHK are too old to qualify. Put another way, the specialist young-university table is precisely the arena where CityUHK competes with HKUST and PolyU, without having to share a ranking with HKU and CUHK — and on this yardstick CityUHK stands very near the front.

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# Why does CityUHK perform so much better in the young-university table than in the overall rankings?

This is the key question for understanding CityUHK's ranking ecology. There is a sharp contrast between CityUHK's position in the THE WUR (73rd in the 2026 edition) and its position in the Young University Rankings (4th in the 2024 edition) — the former pits it against over 2,000 universities worldwide, the latter against just 673 institutions under 50. But the deeper reason lies in the indicator weightings.

Reputation weightings carry an "age bias". In the THE WUR, reputation surveys account for a substantial share of the mark, and long-established famous universities enjoy an inbuilt advantage in how academics and employers respond. The young-university table's "de-reputationing" recalibration increases the relative weight of hard data — research output, citation impact, internationalisation ratios — and these are precisely the areas where CityUHK's intensive research investment in recent years has built strength.

CityUHK's two "perfect-score" calling cards are doubly rewarded in this table. In the THE WUR, CityUHK has scored a perfect 100 in the Industry pillar for several years running, ranking world No. 1^※, and has also led Hong Kong in International Outlook for eight consecutive years^※ — these two strengths translate directly into high scores in the young-university table, and with the competitor pool shrunk to 673 institutions the relative advantage becomes even more pronounced.

A lean size can be an advantage. Many of the ranking indicators — internationalisation, citations per paper, student–staff ratio — are essentially ratio-based indicators: they look at percentages rather than absolute scale. CityUHK has a moderately sized student body, high internationalisation, and strong research output per capita, which gives it a natural edge on ratio-based metrics; the young-university table's smaller competitor set lets this advantage play out fully.

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# How does CityUHK perform in the QS "Under 50" ranking? How does it differ from the THE version?

QS runs its young-university ranking independently and with a different approach. It applies the same six indicators used in its flagship QS World University Rankings — Academic Reputation, Citations per Paper, Employer Reputation, Student–Staff Ratio, International Faculty Ratio, International Student Ratio — to all institutions that meet the "founded within the last 50 years" threshold, compiling a separate table. This means the reputation survey weightings remain intact, unlike THE's "de-reputationing".

Verified CityUHK data in the QS "Under 50" ranking:

(CityUHK's historical trend in the QS Under 50 table cross-checked against StudyIn.HK analysis^※ and the CityU Wikipedia entry^※; full historical QS tables are not always publicly accessible without login.)

In the QS table, Nanyang Technological University (NTU) has led the Under 50 ranking for many years^※, with HKUST consistently second. CityUHK's QS rank (8th in 2024) is somewhat lower than its THE equivalent (4th in 2024) — the root cause is that QS retains a high reputation weighting, and while HKUST was founded only in 1991, its sustained track record in engineering and science disciplines gives it an edge in global scholar surveys.

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# THE suspended the Young University Rankings in 2025. What does that mean?

THE has announced the suspension of the Young University Rankings, describing the move as "pending a review of how we present overall rankings data on our website, including university ages and other characteristics"^※.

This means the 2024 edition is, for now, the last version for which formal results can be cited; CityUHK's 4th place will therefore be its freeze-frame achievement in the series for the immediate future. Whether or how THE restarts the table remains without an official timeline. The THE WUR and other specialist tables (by subject, internationalisation impact, etc.) are unaffected and continue to be released on their usual schedule.

From an information-accuracy perspective: any future reference to CityUHK's "THE young university rank" should be qualified as "4th in the THE Young University Rankings 2024 (the last edition published by THE)", not simply "CityUHK is ranked 4th in THE's young university list" — an undated claim risks serious misinterpretation.

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# What other authoritative young-university perspectives exist?

Beyond THE and QS, other bodies also produce supplementary assessments by institutional age, and CityUHK performs strongly in them too.

Nature Index Young Universities (2025 edition):

In late 2025, Nature Index (part of Springer Nature) published the "Nature Index 2025 Young Universities Supplement"^※. This table focuses on universities aged 50 or under and measures their article output and fractional count across 145 leading natural- and health-science journals (including the Nature family, Science, and Cell) over 2020–2024. CityUHK's performance in that supplement:

The Nature Index differs methodologically from the THE and QS young-university tables in a major way: it looks only at top-tier science journal output, ignoring teaching, reputation, internationalisation and other dimensions — it is a pure quantitative measure of high-impact research publications. The fact that CityUHK appears in the top five to ten across three independent young-university frameworks provides multi-dimensional corroboration that it sits in the global top tier of young institutions.

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# A few rules of thumb for reading the numbers

A few cross-checks can guard against misinterpretation when reading CityUHK's young-university rankings:

1. Different definitions, different ranks. Even among tables both labelled "young university", THE (de-reputationed) and QS (reputation retained) give CityUHK different scores — 4th in THE 2024 vs 8th in QS 2024. The gap comes from the reputation weighting, not from the institution itself.
2. A specialist table is not comparable to an overall table. CityUHK's 4th place in the THE Young University Rankings ≠ 4th in the THE World University Rankings (where it was 73rd). The competitor sets are not the same; conflating them leads to nonsense.
3. A suspended table does not erase past achievement. THE's 2025 suspension is an internal THE operational decision, unrelated to CityUHK. The fact of CityUHK's 4th in 2024 remains valid, but if no subsequent edition appears the figure will gradually date.
4. Three independent frameworks reinforce each other. THE 2024 4th, QS 2024 8th, Nature Index 2025 4th — three different lenses all place CityUHK in the global top ten young universities, giving the finding higher credibility through mutual corroboration.
5. "Young" eligibility has an expiry date. Counting from its 1984 founding, CityUHK will exceed the "under 50" threshold around 2034 (depending on each ranking's exact cut-off year), after which it will automatically exit this class of specialist table. Its performance during this window of "young" advantage is one of the most telling ranking narratives in CityUHK's recent history.

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