Covenant University (CU) has been ranked the best university in Nigeria for the second time in five years.

This is despite the institution’s ranking dropping to its lowest in five years.

According to the Times Higher Education World University Rankings 2024 published on Wednesday, Nigerian university standards experienced a significant drop.

A total of 1,904 universities from 108 countries and regions were considered before the standings were determined.

Covenant University shared the same overall ranking score of 32.7–36.9 with the University of Ibadan (UI).

This global ranking system is one of the most reliable based on 13 performance indicators that include tertiary educational institutions’ performance across teaching, international outlook, knowledge transfer and research.

The last time Covenant University, a private university, made it to the top of university rankings in the world was 2020.

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Between the 2020 and 2024 rankings, the highest-rated Nigerian universities fell from being among the top 400 universities in the world to being among top the 800 worldwide. The ranking shows a great gulf between Nigeria’s top university and the top university in the world.

In the 2024 ranking, Oxford’s overall ranking score was 98.5.

The University of Oxford in the United Kingdom has been the top-rated university in the world for the past eight years, a consistency the University of Ibadan has almost replicated in Nigeria.

However, the overall ranking scores of both UI and CU are at their lowest in the last five years.

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The most recent criteria taken into account to arrive at the overall ranking score were teaching, research environment, research, industry and international outlook.

The top Nigerian universities which had their best overall ranking in the 40s range have now significantly dropped to the 30s level. No top Nigerian university has ever made an average overall ranking score of 50.

CU’s overall ranking score was 38.8–42.3 while UI’s score was 35.3–38.7 in 2020.

UI was Nigeria’s top-rated university at 39.8–43.5 and 40.9–44 in 2021 and 2022 respectively.

In 2023, UI and the University of Lagos (UNILAG) shared the top spot among Nigerian universities on the global ranking table with a score range of 42.1–44.9. They were among the top 500 universities in the world during the period.

CU and UI’s 32.7–36.9 overall score range is the lowest on record for Nigeria’s best universities since 2019 when both institutions returned a 26–33.4 range.

Before 2019, UI got far lower scores and other Nigerian universities were unrated.

In 2018, UI got a 15.6–21.4 overall score range while it returned a terrible 8.3–18.15 score range in 2017. The same university appeared as the first Nigerian tertiary institution on this global university ranking in 2016 with no overall score.