2025 Academic Reputation Survey
As the landscape of global higher education continues to evolve, so does the importance of robust, inclusive, and data-informed assessments of institutional excellence. During the fielding period of September and October 2025—the Academic Reputation Survey will once again extend invitations to one million academics worldwide, continuing its longstanding commitment to capturing expert perspectives on research and teaching across disciplines and regions. This sustained scale reflects the trust placed in the academic community to shape meaningful evaluations of institutional reputation.
This invitation-only survey contributes to the Global Institutional Profiles Project, which aims to build comprehensive, comparative profiles of leading research institutions across the globe for Web of Science related products, including InCites and Web of Science Research Intelligence, and the U.S. News Best Global Universities Rankings, a trusted benchmark for academic excellence worldwide, shaping decisions for students, institutions, and policymakers across more than 100 countries.
A multilingual, inclusive approach
Recognizing the diversity of the academic community, the 2025 survey will be offered in eight languages: English, French, German, Spanish, Portuguese, Japanese, Simplified Chinese, and Arabic. This multilingual approach is designed to reduce language bias and ensure broader participation from scholars across regions and disciplines.
Disciplinary breadth
Respondents will be asked to evaluate institutions within six major academic domains:
- Engineering and technology
- Physical sciences
- Life Sciences
- Clinical, preclinical and health
- Social sciences
- Arts and humanities
This structure allows for nuanced insights into institutional strengths across both STEM, social sciences, and humanities fields.
How is the survey distributed?
Survey participation is by invitation only–participants are carefully selected by geographical location and discipline for statistically relevant sampling. This curated approach enhances the reliability and depth of the data, making the results not only statistically robust but also intellectually meaningful.
Shaping the future together with the academic community
Participating in this survey is not merely a professional courtesy—it is a meaningful act of stewardship. By sharing our informed perspectives, academics help ensure that institutional reputations are grounded in genuine academic insight, not just metrics. This is our opportunity to collectively influence the standards by which universities are evaluated and celebrated worldwide.
The way Clarivate approached this survey matters—for more details, explore the methodology here.
