Top universities in the world 2023

MIT is based in Cambridge, Massachusetts, a university town of under 150,000 inhabitants. This town is also home to Harvard University – making it one of the world’s most prestigious hubs of academic tuition and research.  

Cambridge is close to Boston, one of the most culturally vibrant and historic cities in the Northeast US. International students account for around 29 percent of enrolments at MIT.   

MIT offers some of the most generous financial aid packages among US universities – with around 38 percent of its undergraduates receiving scholarships or grants equal to or greater than the cost of their tuition, with 26 percent of students graduating debt-free.   

MIT is also one of a handful of elite US institutions which offer need-blind admission for all undergraduate candidates, including those from outside the US. This means students’ ability to pay is not considered during the application process, and, once a place has been offered, the university pledges to contribute enough to make attendance possible. 

Learn more about studying in the US. 

This year’s ranking features two new indicators - International Research Network and Employment Outcomes. 

These are both unweighted this year, which means they don’t affect the overall score or rank of a university. Instead, they have been included so QS can gather feedback from institutions ahead of fully including them within the ranking in next year’s methodology.