St Andrews best in the UK for teaching

Saturday 11 September 2021

The University of St Andrews has been ranked best in Scotland, and maintains its place in the top three universities in the UK according to the Guardian University Guide published today (11 September 2021).

The Guardian Guide places St Andrews in the top three UK universities for the eighth year running, ranking one percentage point behind second-placed Cambridge and 2.2 percentage points behind top-ranked Oxford. St Andrews is the only Scottish University ranked in the top ten UK universities.

The Guide ranks universities by the strength of student satisfaction, expenditure per student, student/staff ratio, career prospects, entry tariff, value-added and continuation.

St Andrews is judged the best in the United Kingdom for student satisfaction with the quality of teaching.

The University also ranked first in the annual league tables for five subjects: Neuroscience, Classics, Computer Science, Art History and International Relations. Nineteen out of the 21 subjects taught at St Andrews ranked in the top ten, with 17 ranking in the top five.

St Andrews maintains its place by virtue of its high scores in students satisfaction with their courses and with teaching. The University’s rank improved for student to staff ratio, average entry tariff (UCAS points) and spend per student.

In Scotland, St Andrews ranked top in seven of the nine league table metrics: student satisfaction with course, student satisfaction with teaching, student satisfaction with feedback, student to staff ratio, spend per student, average entry tariff and continuation.

The Guardian Guide is one of three national league tables, publishing annually alongside the Complete University Guide and the Times and Sunday Times Good University Guide. It calculates an institutional position by aggregating subject league tables.

For the 2022 Guide, due to the disruption caused by the global pandemic, the National Student Survey (NSS) was given 20 percent rather than 25 percent weighting. Due to a delay in the release of the Graduate Outcomes (GO) 2018-2019 data, the GO 2017-2018 data was used for the second year in a row. All of the other metrics relate to academic year 2019-2020. Further methodology can be found on the Guardian Guide website.


The Guardian University Guide 2021 is available online: Guardian University Guide 2022.

Issued by the University of St Andrews Communications Office.

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