Forbes magazine has presented the annual ranking of the 100 best Russian universities in 2025. The long list includes 564 universities across the country.
Moscow City University ranked 45th with a score of 25.96 points, rising 5 places compared to last year. Forbes rated MCU’s academic environment at 7.79 points and networking quality at 18.17 points. Notably, MCU is significantly ahead of other pedagogical universities in the ranking, holding leading positions in its category.
The ranking is based on data from the Russian Ministry of Education and Science, surveys of major employers, and publicly available information. It evaluates universities across five key criteria:
1. Networking quality – based on applicants’ average scores (70%) and the share of national and international Olympiad winners among students (30%).
2. Reputation among employers – surveyed from 64 top Russian companies, assessing overall university reputation and the quality of graduate training by industry.
3. International reputation – measured by presence in prestigious world rankings (ARWU, THE, QS), including both institutional and subject-specific ratings.
4. Academic environment – a composite of faculty salaries, qualifications, internationalisation of programmes, financial stability, and faculty-to-student ratio.
5. Forbes factor – based on the number of graduates included in Forbes 2025 Russian billionaires list, awarding 0.5 points per graduate up to a maximum for 13 or more.
Photo: MCU