The twelfth edition of the QS World University Rankings by Subject compiled by global higher education analysts QS Quacquarelli Symonds, provides an independent comparative analysis of 15,200 individual university programs studied at 1543 universities in 88 locations across the world, across 51 academic disciplines. Harvard University and MIT world’s leaders in twelve subjects each, University of Oxford leads in six subjects.
52 Arab region universities feature in this edition, with 324 programs ranked: in 2022, 42 drop, 121 are unchanged, 64 are new entries.
| Number | Top | Top | Top | Top | Top | All | RankedUniversities | Ratio university/ranked programs | |
| 1 | 10 | 20 | 50 | 100 | 200 | ||||
| Saudi Arabia | 0 | 1 | 2 | 5 | 21 | 62 | 91 | 10 | 9.1 |
| United Arab Emirates | 1 | 1 | 3 | 9 | 49 | 9 | 5.4 | ||
| Lebanon | 1 | 2 | 11 | 34 | 4 | 8.5 | |||
| Egypt | 8 | 23 | 84 | 13 | 6.5 | ||||
| Iraq | 1 | 4 | 9 | 4 | 2.3 | ||||
| Oman | 1 | 2 | 8 | 4 | 2.0 | ||||
| Kuwait | 1 | 1 | 6 | 2 | 3.0 | ||||
| Qatar | 5 | 19 | 1 | 19.0 | |||||
| Jordan | 2 | 23 | 4 | 5.8 | |||||
| Bahrain | 1 | 1 | 1 | 1.0 |
The Arab region universities also feature 57 times in the Rankings by Faculty Area (Arts & Humanities, Engineering & Technology, Life Sciences, Natural Sciences, Social Sciences), with 30 improved rank positions. The most ranked university programs in the region are in Engineering (88), Computer Science (31) and Medicine (31). Egypt has the largest number of ranked universities (13), followed by Saudi Arabia (10) and the United Arab Emirates.
The top regional university is Saudi’s King Fahd University of Petroleum & Minerals, ranking 6th globally in Petroleum Engineering and 16th globally in Engineering – Mineral & Mining. The second-best regional university is UAE’s Khalifa University, which breaks into the top-20 in Petroleum Engineering.
Qatar has the highest ratio of university/ranked programs.
| Arab Region’s universities among the World’s Top 50 in QS World University Rankings by Subject | ||||
| 2022 | 2021 | |||
| 6 | 7 | Petroleum Engineering | King Fahd University of Petroleum & Minerals | Saudi Arabia |
| 16 | 16 | Engineering – Mineral & Mining | ||
| 20 | 21 | Petroleum Engineering | Khalifa University | United Arab Emirates |
| 27 | 34 | Petroleum Engineering | King Abdullah University of Science & Technology (KAUST) | Saudi Arabia |
| 37 | 46 | Pharmacy & Pharmacology | King Abdulaziz University (KAU) | |
| 40 | 51-100 | Development Studies | American University of Beirut (AUB) | Lebanon |
| 43 | 51-60 | Dentistry | King Saud University | Saudi Arabia |
