Lancaster University is among the best in the UK. We're top 10 in The Complete University Guide 2027 for four years running and consistently placed in the top 15 in major UK league tables. We also rank highly in international league tables such as the QS World Rankings.
League tables can't tell you everything, but they're a good place to start. Out of over 120 UK universities, we are consistently ranked in the top 15 in major UK league tables.
Lancaster University is ranked 10th in the UK by The Complete University Guide 2027
Lancaster University is ranked 14th in the UK by The Guardian University Guide 2026
Lancaster University is ranked 15th in the UK by The Times And Sunday Times Good University Guide 2026
Lancaster University is ranked 164th of 1,504 world universities by QS World University Rankings 2027
Lancaster University is one of only 16 UK Universities with 5 stars in QS World University Rankings 2026
Lancaster University has been awarded a Gold rating in the Teaching Excellence Framework (TEF) 2023.
TEF Gold
In the 2026 National Student Survey, students responded positively about their teaching and learning experience at Lancaster University.
Lancaster University has been awarded 5 Stars for overall performance in the globally renowned QS World Ratings. The evaluation features 5 Stars rating for each category – teaching, employability, global engagement, research, facilities, subject ranking and environmental impact.
The QS Stars rating system assesses universities worldwide for best practices. Lancaster is one of only 16 UK institutions with an overall five-star rating, and one of 129 universities worldwide.
QS World Ratings
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Lancaster's historic city centre
Lancaster's on-campus accommodation has 6,700 bed spaces for undergraduate and postgraduate students.
In the 2024 Global Student Living Awards - based on student feedback - Lancaster has been shortlisted in two categories:
Top 10 for job prospects - Lancaster University has been rated among the top 10 best universities for job prospects (StudentCrowd 2026).
Lancaster University is among the top 30 most targeted universities by the UK's top graduate employers according to The Graduate Market in 2026 report. The UK Graduate Careers Survey, conducted by High Fliers Research in association with The Times, is the largest and most authoritative annual survey of its kind.
Careers and employabilityLancaster is a research-intensive university that underpins teaching and learning with the latest innovations and thinking.
At work in the Physics Isolab
According to the Complete University Guide 2027, Lancaster University is joint third in the UK for research intensity, which measures the proportion of staff involved in high-quality research. We’re in good company with Cambridge and Oxford.
Our results in the latest Research Excellence Framework (REF2021) confirm our position in delivering world-quality research.
In the REF 2021, Lancaster delivers world-quality research, with 91% of our research independently rated as 'internationally excellent' or 'world-leading ', including 46% rated in the highest category of 4*.
99% of Lancaster’s overall research environment is rated world-leading or internationally excellent. This includes areas such as research support, training and facilities.
Since the last REF was completed in 2014, Lancaster has doubled its grant capture. We have also grown in scale, with more than 50% more staff submitted than in 2014.
Research at Lancaster UniversityLancaster University has been awarded a Queen Elizabeth Prize for Education for its pioneering work in digital literacy.
Queen Elizabeth Prize for Education
