Webometrics publishes web rankings of Australian universities as part of their world rankings.

Webometrics ranking

Webometrics ranks universities by:

  • the volume of material they post on the internet and
  • the number of external links to that material.

The rankings indicate a university's reputation and prominence. They complement research and reputation rankings from QS, Times and Shanghai ARWU.

Webometrics 2021 Rankings for Australia

Aust rank University World rank
1 University of Melbourne 41
2 University of New South Wales 47
3 University of Queensland 50
4 University of Sydney 51
5 Monash University 62
6 Australian National University 77
7 University of Adelaide 96
8 University of Western Australia 123
9 Curtin University 195
10 Queensland University of Technology 198
11 University of Technology Sydney 207
12 Macquarie University 210
13 Deakin University 223
14 Griffith University 234
15 RMIT University 245
16 University of Wollongong 261
17 University of Newcastle 307
18 La Trobe University 324
19 University of Tasmania 342
20 University of South Australia 359
21 Western Sydney University 392
22 Flinders University 402
23 James Cook University 414
24 Murdoch University 579
25 Edith Cowan University 598
26 Charles Sturt University 676
27 Victoria University 678
28 University of New England 695
29 Australian Catholic University 699
30 University of Canberra 741
31 University of Southern Queensland 755
32 Southern Cross University 859
33 CQUniversity 903
34 University of the Sunshine Coast 947
35 Charles Darwin University 994
36 Federation University Australia 1115
37 Bond University 1128
38 Swinburne University of Technology 1436
40 University of Notre Dame Australia 2975
42 Torrens University Australia 4481
75 University of Divinity 10924

Webometrics Ranking Method

The ranking formula has 4 components:

  1. Impact (50%): Number of links to the university's website
  2. Presence (17%): Number of web pages published by the university
  3. Openness (17%): Number of academic publications on the internet
  4. Excellence (17%): Number of academic publications on the internet that are cited often.

Value to Future Students

The Webometrics rankings offer an alternative measure of the overall strength of universities.

According to Webometrics, the purpose of the rankings is to promote global access to academic knowledge produced by universities. To pursue higher Webometrics rankings, a university needs to enlarge its online academic research footprint.

Top universities are publishing millions of pages produced by dozens of departments and services, hundreds of research teams and thousands of scholars. Strong web presence informs of a wide variety of factors that are clearly correlated with the global quality of the institution.

While encouraging open access to research knowledge is a good thing, the rankings have limited relevance to study choices.

  • The rankings objectively measure web presence.
  • Web presence and education quality do not have a strong, direct relationship.

A large web presence is a combination of university size, research focus, and commitment to web publishing. Increasing any of these indicates institutional strength. But they are not reliable ways to improve teaching services.

More Australian university rankings

Combined lists

Australian unis compared

Shanghai

Shanghai ARWU - Research

Times

Times Higher Education - Reputation